U.S. Returns 523 Stolen Artifacts to Mexico goodmenproject.com - get the latest breaking news, showbiz & celebrity photos, sport news & rumours, viral videos and top stories from goodmenproject.com Daily Mail and Mail on Sunday newspapers.
Tuesday, April 20, 2021
EL PASO, TEXAS According to a statement released by U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement, Homeland Security Investigations (HSI) and National Park Service representatives handed over more than 500 stone artifacts to Mexican consul General Mauricio Ibarra Ponce de León at the Mexican Consulate last week. Special agents traced the smuggled knives, arrowheads, and stone tools to a single individual after National Park Service rangers spotted some of the artifacts in Big Bend National Park, which is located in southwest Texas. “We are committed to working with our law enforcement partners and foreign governments to ensure that individuals do not profit from these criminal acts,” said Erik P. Breitzke, special agent in charge of HSI El Paso. Trafficking in antiquities is estimated to be a multi-billion-dollar transnational criminal enterprise, as reported by Homeland Security Investigations. To read about Texas Alibates Flint Quarries National Monument,
Smuggled pre-Hispanic-era artefacts repatriated by the US to Mexico US Immigration and Customs Enforcement
The investigations arm of the US Department of Homeland Security (HSI) has returned 523 artefacts predating the Spanish conquest to Mexico in a repatriation ceremony at the Mexican Consulate in El Paso, Texas, officials say.
The pieces were seized in August 2016 after an investigation that was triggered months earlier by the discovery of some of the artefacts in Big Bend National Park in southwest Texas. The objects include stone arrowheads, knife blades and tools that were illegally imported into the US from Mexico and offered for sale, US Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) announced.
By Paco Zavala
At the head table, from left to right: Christopher M. Peregrin, Tijuana River National Estuarine Research Reserve Manager; German Lizola, representing the Governor of Baja California; Mauricio Ibarra Ponce de Leon, Director General of Special Affairs for Mexico’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs; Roberto F. Salmon Castelo , IBWC Mexico Section Commissioner; Edward Drusina, U.S. IBWC Commissioner; William A. Ostick, U.S. Consul General in Tijuana; and David Gibson, Executive Officer of the San Diego Regional Water Control Board
This past Monday, October 5th, at 6:00 p.m., the International Boundary and Water Commission Minute 320, titled “General Framework for Binational Cooperation on Transboundary Issues in the Tijuana River Basin” was signed by representatives of the U.S. and Mexican governments during a solemn ceremony held at “El Cubo”, a space within Tijuana’s Cultural Center. For IBWC, it was signed by Mexican Commissioner Roberto F. Salmon Costelo, and