<p>I’m curious. From a legal standpoint, if it is a fact that the two bronze sculptures recently sold by Christie’s were stolen in the nineteenth century, then shouldn’t they be returned to the current pretender to the Chinese throne?</p>
<p>Yes, it is a fact.</p>
<p>But why don’t white Americans return the land to the native Americans?</p>
<p>For precedents, I was thinking more along the lines of Nazi plunder. I was under the impression that the Allied powers spent a great deal of effort trying to reunite art works with their rightful owners.</p>
<p>These sculptures worth a lot of money and nobody wants to return it to its home country without compensation. And China refuses to purchase it back because the transaction may imply that the ownership of France is legal.</p>
<p>The invasion of China took place much earlier than the second world war. This event has nothing to do with allied power or anything like that.</p>
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<p>I never said the event had “…to do with allied power or anything like that.” I was pointing out that in the past, significant effort was made to restore stolen art to the rightful owners and asking why that’s different. Art stolen by the Nazis in the 1930s and 1940s was also “worth a lot of money.” Does that mean that when the rightful owners were identified, the people who stole them were entitled to compensation for giving up what wasn’t even theirs to begin with?</p>
<p>It appears uncontested that the statues belonged to the House of Aisin Gioro and were stolen some time during or after the Second Opium War. I made this thread because I wanted to know why they shouldn’t be returned to the current pretender to the Chinese throne. I did not make this thread to open a can of worms about Native American land.</p>
<p>The point is that the Chinese sculpture was stolen by France, not the Nazis. What the allied power tried to do is to fight against the Nazis, not the France or UK. If I were the allied power, I would probably ignore the crime France committed. </p>
<p>I believe France should return the sculptures to China.</p>