Herdsman entitled to keep gold nugget

A LOCAL HERDSMAN in Qinghe county in the Xinjiang Uygur autonomous region found a 7.85-kilogram gold nugget shaped like the map of the Chinese mainland last week. Comments:

Although being no cultural relic, the gold nugget in the special shape found by a Xinjiang herdsman is of great cultural value due to its shape and should be possessed by a museum instead of an individual. Of course, the local government could only advise the herdsman to relinquish the gold, which belongs to the country according to its current mineral resources law without forcing him to give up a reward for its discovery. It thus calls for the precedent of specific reward rules for similar controversies.

Beijing Morning Post, Feb 9