Nepal celebrates return of stolen 13th-century Buddha statue from New York

"Our god is coming back, temple-goer Sunkesari Shakya, 67, told the AFP news agency, recalling the day the statue was stolen, wreaking havoc in the community."

"One of the things we are focusing on is to be able to bring back some of these incredible artefacts that decades past got into the wrong hands. We are trying to right a wrong from the past."

A 13th-century Buddha statue, stolen from a Nepali temple in the 1980s, has been returned and reinstalled in its original location in Kathmandu. The statue was carried back in a palanquin during a ceremony attended by a U.S. envoy, coinciding with the Buddha Jayanti festival. A replica had been used for worship in the meantime. The statue was previously at Tibet House US in New York, where it was gifted by an unknown monk. Efforts are ongoing to return cultural artefacts to their rightful places.

Read at www.aljazeera.com