Dutch court dismisses Chinese plea for mummy`s return
(Artdaily.org)

A court in Amsterdam on Wednesday dismissed a case brought by Chinese villagers who sought the return of a stolen 1,000-year-old mummified monk they said had been obtained by a Dutch collector. The small eastern Chinese village of Yangchun has accused Oscar van Overeem of having bought the Buddha statue containing the remains of a monk in Hong Kong in 1996. The human-sized Buddha in a lotus position, called the `Zhanggong Patriarch`, disappeared from a temple in Yangchun in late 1995 after being worshipped there for centuries. Missing for two decades, villagers in 2015 recognised the precious artefact as part of a display at the `Mummy World Exhibition` at Budapest`s Natural History Museum. The statue was subsequently withdrawn. A scan of the statue revealed a skeleton inside -- said to be that of the monk who lived nearly a millenium ago during China`s Song dynasty.