Global culture officials are to meet to discuss how to recover ancient treasures which they say have been stolen and displayed overseas.

全球文化官员将齐聚埃及首都开罗商讨如何追回被偷盗、在海外被展览的古文化财产。

The US recently returned a 3,000-year-old wooden sarcophagus to Egypt

Sixteen countries will be represented at the two-day conference in Cairo.

It has been organised by Egypt's Supreme¹ Council of Antiquities² (SCA), which wants many pharaonic（古埃及法老王的） items returned by Western museums.

The SCA said the forum³ would discuss "the protection and restitution⁴（归还，赔偿） of cultural heritage（文化遗产） ."

Representatives will include cultural officials from Greece, Italy and China, all of which have lost ancient artefacts（人工制品，加工品） over the centuries which that they now want back.

Stolen artefacts

At the conference, representatives will announce their wish-lists and consider strategies to persuade museums overseas to respond to their demands.

They are also expected to call on the United Nations cultural body, Unesco, to amend⁵（修订，修改） a convention（大会，协定） banning export and ownership of antiquities（古物，古迹） stolen after 1970 - so that they can pursue items that were snatched（抢夺） earlier, says the BBC's Yolande Knell⁶ in Cairo.

In recent years, the Egyptian authorities have stepped up their efforts to recover stolen artefacts, with the head of the SCA, Zahi Hawass, attracting international attention for his efforts.

Last year, he broke off ties with the Louvre museum until France returned fragments chipped from a wall painting in an ancient Egyptian tomb.

He has repeatedly asked for the Rosetta Stone（罗塞达石） - which has been kept in the British Museum for more than 200 years - and a 3,400-year-old bust⁷（半身像，胸部） of Queen Nefertiti on display in Berlin, to be given back to Egypt.