Most were returned by the United States; the standout is a Mixtec turquoise-mosaic skull recovered from a Dutch museum, among 17,778 pieces in recent years.

This article by Alonso Urrutia and Alma E. Muñoz originally appeared in the July 10, 2026 edition of La Jornada, Mexico’s premier left wing daily newspaper.

Mexico City. So far during the current administration, the Mexican government has recovered 3,770 pieces of cultural heritage through repatriation, which is ten times the amount recovered during Enrique Peña Nieto’s entire six-year term, reported the director of the National Institute of Anthropology and History, Omar Vázquez.

Photo showing the number of cultural artifacts recovered during each presidency: Hugo Salvador / EL UNIVERSAL

Vázquez also emphasized that in recent years, the recovery of 17,778 pieces has been achieved, since during Andrés Manuel López Obrador’s government 14,162 pieces were repatriated.

During the presidential press conference, Vázquez highlighted that for the most part these pieces come from the United States, from where 3,369 pieces have been recovered during this term. He also detailed that 174 have been repatriated from Italy; 133 from Canada, 19 from France, and from Spain.

He explained that one of the most important pieces is a skull covered in turquoise tesserae, which was repatriated from the ethnological museum of the Netherlands. It is a Mixtec piece originating from the Puebla and Oaxaca region. Another significant piece is a carved panel repatriated from New York, from the Yaxchilán region, Chiapas, whose creation is estimated between the years 600 and 900 AD. It is a jaguar bird, a ruler, a central figure of the Maya, made up of 24 glyph blocks in which we can observe a scene with a political and propagandistic function.

On another note, he reported that with an investment of seven million pesos, the rehabilitation and reopening of the Museum of Teotihuacan Grandeur was achieved, with an exhibition of 154 pieces, 80 percent of which “are previously unseen,” meaning they had not been exhibited before.

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