Artifacts should return to China

China wants its stuff back, but 18 museums in France, the United States and Spain have drafted the first public refusal to return illegally obtained artifacts to their original countries.\nAn estimated one million Chinese artifacts currently rest in over 200 museums across the world, most of which were plundered in times of war.\nThe museums claim that the Chinese request comes too late. They say that the acquisition of relics in the past can not be equated with the illegal trade of antiquities today, that the U.N. Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization's ruling stands, and that because the artifacts were taken before 1970, they get to stay where they are, not in China where they belong.\nWhere do these museums find the right to justify owning someone else's property? Simply put, it's not their stuff. Educational or not, the museums have no ground upon which to argue for keeping something that doesn't belong to them. If they desire, they can request to purchase or borrow the artifacts for exhibition, but keeping them for free is preposterous.\nDirector of the study center on ancient culture under the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences Li Xueqin told ABC News, "…we are just protecting our rights. Culture is the spirit of a nation and relics are the purveyors of culture."\nWould a refusal come so swiftly had the artifacts belonged to the United States? \nDoubtful. \n-- JP Benitez and Andrew LeMar