US museum to return Turkish bust

22 July 2011 Last updated at 15:35 GMT The stunning piece portrays the demigod Hercules The top half of the Weary Herakles statue, which was bought by the Boston Museum of Fine Arts in 1982, is to be returned to its native Turkey.

After an ongoing dispute, the MFA will reunite the bust with its lower half at the Antalya Museum later this year.

The announcement is seen as a victory for Turkey which is trying to retrieve artefacts it believes have been looted throughout the years.

It is thought the full statue will return to Boston on a short-term loan.

The top half of the sculpture of weary demigod Hercules was purchased in 1981 from a German dealer, by the MFA and late New York art collecter Leon Levy.

A year later, it was displayed at the US museum before being put into storage in 2007.

Turkish archaeologists were convinced the bust had been looted and taken from the country. At the same time, the lower half of the statue was discovered in 1980 at Perge in southern Turkey.

The MFA always denied that was the case, insisting the bust could have been found "any time since the Italian Renaissance".

Speaking to the Times newspaper, Katherine Getchell from the Boston Museum, said: "It's only in the last couple of years that they've presented us with photos and other evidence of looting from that site."

This is the latest victory for Turkey's campaign to track down lost antiquity.

In May, the Peramon Museum in Germany agreed to return a Hittite sphinx after the Turkish Culture Minister threatened to ban German archaeologists from digs in the country.

Ertugrul Gunay told the Times that the country plans to "fight in the same way for all our other artefacts".

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Boycott at new Turkish parliament

28 June 2011 Last updated at 14:43 GMT The swearing-in ceremony went ahead Opposition parties in Turkey have boycotted the swearing-in of the new parliament after judges barred nine elected MPs from taking their seats.

The biggest opposition party, the secular CHP, joined pro-Kurdish members in shunning the swearing-in ceremony at the parliament in Ankara.

The ruling AKP won this month's polls but is under pressure to consult the opposition on big policy decisions.

One such decision is the drafting of a new constitution.

The election was widely praised as a sign of Turkey's political maturity but Tuesday's boycott has exposed old fault-lines that still threaten the country's democratic development, the BBC's Jonathan Head reports from Istanbul.

Threat to stability

A series of judicial decisions stripped one MP of his seat and barred eight others from attending parliament because they were in prison, on charges that critics say are politically motivated.

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We cannot talk about democracy in a country where judges base their decisions on the government's interest, not universal principles of justice”

End Quote Kemal Kilicdaroglu CHP leader The opposition parties argue that the jailed MPs are entitled to parliamentary immunity because they are still on trial and have not been convicted.

CHP leader Kemal Kilicdaroglu accused the judges of favouring the government.

"We cannot talk about democracy in a country where judges base their decisions on the government's interest, not universal principles of justice," he said.

The CHP won 135 seats in the 550-seat parliament.

The pro-Kurdish BDP refused even to attend the opening session of parliament, after the election board transferred one of the 36 seats it had won to the AKP.

The MP who lost his seat had been convicted of making statements supporting the Kurdish insurgent movement, the PKK, something all BDP candidates did during the campaign.

Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan has criticised the opposition parties for nominating jailed candidates.

"Could they not have found other candidates?" he asked on Monday. "They nominated these people knowing that it would cause such a problem."

A continued boycott by the BDP could re-ignite the conflict in the Kurdish south-east, our correspondent says.

The CHP boycott will also make it difficult for Mr Erdogan to start working on the new constitution, which he has called the top priority of his government.

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