Museum wants Rosetta Stone back in Egypt

AN EGYPTIAN museum has renewed calls for the Rosetta Stone to be returned after more than 200 years in the British Museum.

The ancient slab, which is engraved with three languages and unlocked the secret of Egyptian hieroglyphs, has been a long-running source of tension between Cairo and London.

British soldiers captured the stone in 1801 after defeating Napoleon’s army in Egypt and took it to the British Museum, where it has long been the mostvisited object. Dr Tarek Tawfik, the director of Giza’s new Grand Egyptian Museum, said: “It would be great to have the Rosetta Stone back in Egypt but this is something that will still need a lot of discussion and cooperation.”

He said he was involved in “vivid discussions” about its possible return, but a British Museum spokesman said: “We have not received a request for the return of the Rosetta Stone.”