Cambodian relics ‘found in New York’

[geovalin]

Stuart White

US federal officials raided the storage unit of a former Manhattan gallery owner on Tuesday, seizing hundreds of antiquities thought to have been illegally looted from countries including Cambodia, The New York Times reported on Wednesday.

According to the Times, the raid was conducted by the Department of Homeland Security on a storage locker in Queens, New York, owned by a family member of Subhash Kapoor, a former antiquities dealer who is awaiting trial for allegedly paying looters to steal Hindu sculptures rendered in stone and bronze. Kapoor is also wanted in the US on accusations of illegally importing the sculptures and falsifying their ownership histories.

Ministry of Foreign Affairs spokesman Koy Kuong said he was not aware of the seizures.

“I may contact our ambassador in Washington,” he added.

Last December, auction house Sotheby’s signed an agreement to turn over a 10th-century sandstone statue believed to have been looted from the Koh Ker temple complex.

http://www.phnompenhpost.com/national/cambodian-relics-%E2%80%98found-new-york%E2%80%99