Troops recover 4,300-year-old statue

By Steven Komarow, USA TODAY

BAGHDAD  Police work in any city takes a lot of digging.

The Bassetki Statue sits in Baghdad"s Iraqi National Museum after a tip from a man held in a separate case led to its recovery. By Anja Niedringhaus, AP

But American military police hunting stolen antiquities here didn't expect to be shoveling feces as part of their investigation.

It paid off, however, when the MPs uncovered one of the Iraqi National Museum's most valuable pieces at the bottom of a Baghdad cesspool.

The 812th Military Police Company, a reserve Army unit from Orangeburg, N.Y., is tracking antiquities that were stolen from the Iraq Museum during looting that followed the U.S. invasion. About 14,000 pieces were stolen, and about a third have been recovered. Many still missing are irreplaceable items from when Iraq was the cradle of civilization.

One of the most important missing relics, until now, was a partial statue of a sitting boy dating back about 4,300 years. The Bassetki Statue, made of cast copper, has an inscription on the base that indicate it decorated the door of the palace of the Akkadian king Naram-Sin, in southern Iraq.

Although it weighs more than 300 pounds, the statue was hauled away by looters. Museum officials worried that they'd never see it again. But like many of the museum's big items, it hadn't gone far.

On Nov. 3, the 812th MPs, working with local Iraqi police, got a tip. Three men in southern Baghdad had another museum piece: a portable fireplace in the shape of a miniature chariot. It had kept an Assyrian king warm more than 2,800 years ago.

The Americans and Iraqi police busted the three. One of the men gave up a bigger secret: the location of the Akkadian statue.

"It just happened to be buried in human feces. So we dug it up, loaded it up on a Humvee and drove it back," Cpl. Cory Hassler, 21 of Guthrie, Okla, recalled on Tuesday, when their find was made public.

Sgt. Emmanuel Gonzales, 35, who in civilian life is a sergeant in the New York City Police Department, said the statue had been coated with grease before it was buried in a cesspool, apparently to protect it from the elements. "I guess some thought process went into it," he said.

The museum director, Donny George Youkhana, praised the work of the police as he showed off the treasures.

Also newly brought to the museum were more than 800 small artifacts that the Italian government retrieved through its anti-smuggling efforts. The pieces were smuggled out of Iraq but were bought and returned.

Youkhana said it was a "bright day" for the museum. But reopening its exhibits to the public is still at least two years away, mostly because the museum's air-conditioning, security and other systems all need replacement.

By then, officials say, much more of its missing collection should be back where it belongs.

"If people are selling artifacts in Baghdad, sooner or later we're going to find out about it, and we're going to be knocking on their door," said Capt. Vance Kuhner, commander of the 812th.