The Metropolitan Museum of Art (Met) in New York has announced that they will be returning 16 sculptures to Cambodia and Thailand. The works have been associated with known antiquities smuggler Douglas Latchford, who was indicted in 2019 prior to his death in 2020. Latchford was a dealer who was charged with “running a vast antiquities trafficking network” in southeast Asia.

The sculptures to be returned were made between the 9^th and 14^th centuries in the Khmer Empire during the Angkorian period, and “reflect the Hindu and Buddhist religious systems prevailing at that time.” They include a sandstone goddess statue from the 10^th century and the ‘Bodhisattva Avalokiteshvara Seated in Royal Ease’, which dates to the late 10^th-early 11^th century and depicts a seated Buddha. The Met have emphasised how it was their initiative to return the objects, with Max Hollein, the director, stating that the museum had been “diligently working with Cambodia and the US Attorney’s Office for years to resolve questions regarding these works of art”. Hollein added that the museum is “committed to pursuing partnerships and collaborations with Cambodia and Thailand that will advance the world’s understanding and appreciation of Khmer art, and we look forward to embarking on this new chapter together.” The Met explained that after the indictment of Latchford, they “proactively reached out to the US Attorney’s Office for the Southern District of New York and to Cambodian officials, and through this cooperative partnership, the museum received new information about the sculptures that made it clear that the works should be transferred.”

Despite this, it does appear that initial requests from Cambodia for the repatriation of these objects were ignored, and that Cambodia enlisted the help of the US Justice Department to work on the return of looted objects. A recent investigative podcast called Dynamite Doug looked into Douglas Latchford’s smuggling and suggested that the relations between the Met and Cambodia representatives were far from positive.

Cambodia’s Minister of Culture and Fine Arts, Phoeurng Sackona, discussed the repatriation, describing it as “an act of healing for our nation”, and commenting that “the enormous importance to the Cambodian people, of these returns is difficult to overstate”. Sackona added that “we ask for other museums and private collectors to contact us to discuss their collections of Cambodian antiquities.” The objects are believed to have been looted during a three-decade period between the mid 1960s and the late 1990s, when extreme political upheaval was occurring in Cambodia and Thailand.

In recent years, other repatriations to Cambodia and Thailand have taken place from museums who also had acquired objects connected to Douglas Latchford. The Denver Art Museum is one example.