"There are a lot of historical artefacts that should be returned to their original owners, but none more important than the Parthenon Marbles.”

George Clooney writing to Janet on the 8th of January this year.

His latest film 'The Midnight Sky' was released a month earlier on 09 December 2020 and there were a number of articles in the weeks that followed including one in the Guardian, written by Tom Lamont. To read that, you can use the link here.

George Clooney remembers when he met Amal in February 2014 and that in the same month he was also in the UK for the launch of 'The Monuments Men', a film about soldiers at the tail-end of the Second World War who were tasked to protect priceless works of European art from Nazi looters.At this time Clooney also viced his  belief that the United Kingdom might return the Parthenon Marbles to Greece. The then Mayor of London Boris Johnson retaliated by comparing the actor to Adolf Hitler. That evening he met with Amal for dinner and she gave George lots more facts about the plight of the Marbles including an update on UNESCO rulings.

Journalist Tom Lamont suggests to Clooney, that the actor owes everything to UK's Prime Minister Johnson: marriage, kids and present state of domestic contentment. George agrees and then suggests he might send a thank you note to  the PM..... plus a comb. We would concurr that a comb would be useful and we sincerely hope that the thank you note may persuade the PM to be more magnanimous when it comes to considering the reunification of the Parthenon Marbles too.

We live in hope and agree with George Clooney that despite the current challenges, here's to better days for all.

Janet Suzman, our Chair was on ERT TV's 9 o'clock news on Saturday 06 March 2021. The interview took place following on from the article that was published in Ta Nea by UK Correspondent Yannis Andritsopoulos that morning. Janet emphasised that all like minded, profound people, hope to see the sculptures removed by Lord Elgin and currently housed in the British Museum's Room 18, re-joining their surviving halves in the Parthenon Gallery of the superlative Acropolis Museum.

Janet added in her press statement to Yannis Andritsopoulos of TA NEA that: "the fact that George Clooney, and an increasing number of thoughtful people in the public eye, would wish to see the Parthenon Marbles reunited with their other halves in the Acropolis Museum is a measure of how aware they are of the justice of such an event. Were it to be achieved it will be the pressure in the public sphere both of respected individuals with high profiles, and a groundswell from the museum-going populace at large that will eventually persuade a great institution like the British Museum to shift its stance. These sculptures belong uniquely to an edifice that still dominates the skyline of Athens and all of Western thinking. They stand at the very heart of Greece’s cultural patrimony. Claiming a spurious ownership is not something such a respected treasure house can continue without feeling a bit foolish, above all because there exists no absolute proof of that ownership. The Museum has more than enough fascinating objects to survive the gesture with its universalist head still held high."

Professor Paul Cartledge as Vice-Chair of the BCRPM and the IARPS added:"We warmly welcome George Clooney's continued supportfor the reunion of the Parthenon Marbles. What is needed now is a supreme generosity of internationalist spirit and moral courage. Our campaign has recently been accompanied by a large wave of international support from various anti-colonial movements calling for the repatriation of cultural treasures. For centuries, colonial powers and their merchants have plundered or individualised, officially or informally, these treasures, either for purely personal gratification or as a means of national self-evolution - or both."

To read the Ta Nea article (in Greek), please follow the link here. 

Many other outlets picked up on this story including The Art Newspaper that also carried Janet Suzman's letter in their March 2021 edition.