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‘The Elgin Marbles should leave this northern whisky-drinking guilt-culture, and be displayed where they belong: in a country of bright sunshine and the landscape of Achilles.’ This view – articulated by Boris Johnson in 1986 when he was studying classics at Oxford – is not shared by Rishi Sunak.
On Monday, the Prime Minister caused a diplomatic spat after he called off a meeting with Kyriakos Mitsotakis, his Greek counterpart, hours before it was scheduled to take place. The reason? Mitsotakis gave an interview to the BBC in which he said the Elgin Marbles must be returned to Greece. The current situation, he added, of having some artefacts in London and the rest in Athens was akin to ‘cutting the Mona Lisa in half’.
As Persephone spends six monthsof the year in Hades, the Marblescould do half the year in Greece
Although Mitsotakis was stating the long-held position of the Greek government, such comments, No.
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