BAGHDAD, Aug. 30 (Xinhua) -- Iraqi Minister of Culture, Tourism and Antiquities Abdul Amir al-Hamdani said that his country will recover from Britain more than 150 ancient tablets belonging to different eras of the civilization of Mesopotamia, said a statement issued by the ministry on Friday.
The statement said that al-Hamdani met on Thursday with Rosie Taber, the political advisor at the British embassy in Baghdad, and the two discussed ways to expand cultural cooperation between the two countries.
Al-Hamdani said "Iraq will recover from Britain 154 artifacts belonging to different eras of the Mesopotamian civilization," the statement said without giving further details about when and how the artifacts would be returned.
Earlier in the day, media reports said that British Museum has completed its biggest ever handover of historical artifacts looted in Iraq. The reports, however, put the number of the ancient collection at 156 inscribed tablets which had been looted following the U.S.-led invasion of Iraq.
The items mostly dated from 2,100 B.C. to 1,800 B.C., originating from the Third Dynasty of Ur Old Babylonian dynasty. They were impounded by customs officials at a freight company near London Heathrow Airport in 2011, according to the reports.
The tablets are mostly economic documents but also include letters, legal and school texts and a mathematical document, they added.
According to official statistics, about 15,000 archaeological pieces of Iraqi treasure-trove from the Stone Age through the Babylonian, Assyrian and Islamic periods were stolen or destroyed by looters mainly in the Iraqi national museum in Baghdad, after the Saddam Hussein's regime was toppled by U.S.-led troops in 2003.
Official statistics also showed that over 10,000 sites in Iraq are officially recognized as archaeological sites, but most of these sites are not safeguarded and many are still being looted on an unprecedented scale in the country.
