HONG KONG: Twenty-one relics, once the possessions of Sun Yat-sen, have gone missing while under the care of the Leisure and Cultural Services Department (LCSD).

The missing relics were part of a HK$1,000,000 collection consisting of some 2,700 items bought from the United States in 2001. They were to have been displayed at the Dr Sun Yat-sun Museum in Mid-levels.

Deputy Director (Culture) Chung Ling-hoi said in a radio interview yesterday that LCSD staff did not count the relics when they arrived in Hong Kong. The department later discovered that 21 pieces were missing, while four hundred additional pieces that were not included in the original order were included in the lot.

Among the missing items is a postcard Sun sent from France to his daughter, a photograph of Sun signed by Song Qingling, teaware belonging to Sun's son-in-law and a portrait of Sun.

An LCSD spokesperson said the department did not report the incident to the police because there is no evidence of criminal activity.

The spokesperson said the museum curator at the time did show sufficient caution and that department has implemented disciplinary measures against the errant official.

The original collection included some 800 letters, 500 documents, 300 pieces of furniture and eating utensils, 400 publications, 70 articles of clothing and over 100 photographs of Sun or his family.

The missing artifacts were discovered by the Audit Commission in late 2005, but the loss was never made public.

The commission reported the loss in an early version of its Audit report in late 2005, but all references to the loss were excised in its final report for March 2006.

Director of Audit Tang Kwok-bun said that the incident was not mentioned in the 2006 report because at that time, the LCSD was conducting an internal investigation. "We omitted the incident, as we did not want this paragraph to hold up the whole report. This did not mean we were not following up on the incident though," he added.

Tang said the explanation given him by the LCSD was that there was a discrepancy between the order list and the items received.

He said the Audit Commission then made recommendations to the LCSD to make regular reviews, update collection policies and strengthen their control measures for the acquisition and safe custody of historic artifacts.

Only six of the 2,700 relics are on permanent display at the Sun Yat-sun Museum.

(HK Edition 08/07/2009 page1)