In January 2009, the two countries signed a memorandum of understanding (MOU) outlining that the US would impose restrictions against the illegal importation of Chinese cultural property.
Since then, 504 lost artefacts have been successfully returned to China in 15 batches, the heritage administration said on Thursday.
The MOU has now been extended for a third time, effective from January this year. It means that Wednesday’s repatriation marked the first cultural relic return since that renewal.
Li said China would continue to implement the bilateral MOU and share information on stolen artefacts with the US, “contributing [the two countries’] wisdom and efforts to protect cultural property and promote cultural exchange”.
They were seized by the Manhattan District Attorney’s Office in New York in March and will be transported back to China at a later date.
“Cultural heritage has the power to bring people together and bridge differences,” Matthew Bogdanos, chief of the Antiquities Trafficking Unit at the Manhattan District Attorney’s Office, said at the handover ceremony.
“The repatriation of lost cultural relics to their country of origin is a righteous act. The US is willing to work together with China to protect the shared cultural heritage of humanity, and make joint efforts towards the common goal of returning lost artefacts,” he was quoted as saying by the NCHA.
Last May, the US returned two important stone carvings to China, and in 2019, China retrieved 361 cultural relics from the US, the largest-scale repatriation of lost Chinese treasures since the MOU came into effect.