What now for the return of the Parthenon Sculptures?

On June 20, Greece and the world museum community celebrated the 10th anniversary of the inauguration of the Acropolis Museum in Athens. The state-of-the-art museum is rightly regarded as a defining structure that has established a dialogue, across time and space, between the sculptural works it houses and the Sacred Rock itself.
But amidst all the euphoria, we should not forget the main reason why the museum was built - namely, to counter the British argument that the Greeks did not have a suitable museum for the Parthenon Sculptures even if they were ever returned to Athens.
For years the British Museum had dreaded the moment when a new museum would rise from the ground in Athens.
In fact, on March 22, 1991, the former keeper of Greek and Roman antiquities at the museum, Brian Cook, had sent a memo to the BM director with this warning: "The next phase of the...