New Mrs Clooney to advise Greece on Marbles claim

Human rights lawyer Amal Alamuddin Clooney, fresh from her marriage to Hollywood heartthrob George Clooney last month, is heading to Athens to advise the Greek government in its battle to repatriate ancient statues, the Elgin Marbles, from Britain.

The Lebanese-born lawyer, who married in a star-studded ceremony in Venice, will meet Greece's Prime Minister Antonis Samaras and Culture Minister Konstantinos Tasoulas alongside her boss, Geoffrey Robertson, their office said on Thursday.

"Mr Robertson and Mrs Clooney were first asked to provide legal advice to the Greek government on this matter in 2011. They will be holding a series of meetings with government officials during their stay," according to a statement.

The pair will be in Athens from Oct 13 to 16.

The Marbles are a set of ancient Greek sculptures taken to London after being removed from the Acropolis in Athens by a British aristocrat, Lord Elgin, while Athens was under Ottoman control in the 19th century. Greece has sought their return from the British Museum for decades, to no avail.

In March, George Clooney backed their return to Greece while promoting his film The Monuments Men.

The trustees of the British Museum maintain that the statues legally belong to the museum. Greece says it is no longer an issue of ownership and that it would accept them back as a permanent loan.

To do so, the Greek government would first have to relinquish its claim to them, the British Museum said.

Amal Alamuddin Clooney, whose legal practice is based in Britain, has represented Ukrainian former prime minister Yulia Tymoshenko at the European Court of Human Rights and WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange in extradition proceedings. She also advised former United Nations secretary-general Kofi Annan on the conflict in Syria.

(China Daily 10/11/2014 page10)