U.S. Customs announced Tuesday, October 20, that it seized ancient carved stones from Cameroon, known as Ikom monoliths, at Miami airport, which arrived in the United States using false documents.
According to experts, these stones were cut between 200 and 1,000 years before Jesus Christ, the United States Customs and Border Protection (CBP) said in a statement.
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Customs did not indicate how many of these stones, a real archaeological treasure, had been seized, but specified that they would be
"repatriated"
to Cameroon.
Ikom monoliths come from a region near the city of Ikom, in southern Nigeria, bordering Cameroon.
According to Unesco, these engraved volcanic stone monoliths have
"a form of writing and a complex system of codified information"
, and
"each stone, like a fingerprint, is unique"
.
This seizure is
“the latest example”
of the efforts made to
“implement international laws on the repatriation of ancient objects
,
” said
Robert Del Toro, customs officer at Miami International Airport.
