Li Xiaojie (R), the head of the State Administration of Cultural Heritage, presents a gold ornament to Liu Weiping, the Gansu provincial governor, at a hand-over ceremony at the Gansu Provincial Museum in Lanzhou city, the capital of Northwest China’s Gansu province, July 20, 2015. Thirty-two gold ornaments stolen from ancient Chinese tombs and held by French collectors were formally handed over to the Gansu Provincial Museum. Li Xiaojie, the head of the State Administration of Cultural Heritage, Liu Weiping, the Gansu province governor, and French Ambassador to China Maurice Gourdault-Montagne attended a ceremony marking an exhibition of the gold ornaments, which are from tombs in Dabuzishan in Lixian county, Gansu province, dating back to the Spring and Autumn period (770 BC-476 BC). The tombs were badly looted during the 1990s and a large number of relics, including the gold ornaments, were smuggled abroad. (Photo: China News Service/Yang Yanmin)
