US to return 900-year-old ancient artefact to Thailand

- Photos: The Nation File

BANGKOK: The Art Institute of Chicago in the United States has expressed its intention to return a 900-year-old artefact believed to have been illegally taken from ruins of Prasat Phanom Rung in the northeastern province of Buri Ram in 1965, the Fine Arts Department announced on Tuesday (June 18).

The artefact, officially called ‘fragment of a pilaster with Krishna lifting Mount Govardhana’, is part of the decorative pieces on the left side of the door frame of Prasat Phanom Rung’s eastern mandapa (square hall), Phnombootra Chadrajoti, the department’s director-general, said.