Berlin’s Nefertiti Trouble

Spiegel Online: Egyptian Official Calls Museum Behavior ‘Suspicious’

October 20, 2009

Spiegel Online: Nefertiti Gets a New Palace: Revamped Neues Museum Finally Opens   in Berlin

New York Times online: When Ancient Artifacts Become Political Pawns

October 16, 2009

Amidst the highly anticipated reopening of Berlin’s Neues Museum, Zahi Hawass, head of the Egyptian Supreme Council of Antiquities, has renewed claims that the Museum’s prized Nefertiti bust was smuggled illegally out of Egypt.  After seventy years, the reopening of the Neues Museum symbolizes for some, as Hermann Parzinger, head of the Prussian Cultural Heritage Foundation and overseer of Berlin’s museums, describes, “the end of the postwar era for the Museum Island. ” Now, during the time of celebration officials must confront this accusation and either validate the authenticity of German rights to the bust or return Nefertiti to Egypt.