DHAKA: Pieces of two rare terracotta Hindu statues stolen in Bangladesh have been uncovered at a rubbish dump two weeks after they were stolen en route to an exhibition in Paris, officials said on Wednesday.

The 1,500-year-old artefacts — statues of the Hindu god Vishnu — were to have featured in an exhibition on Bangladesh culture and history at Paris’s Guimet Museum. They went missing from Dhaka’s Zia international airport on Dec 23, prompting the Bangladesh government to cancel the exhibition.

The country’s Rapid Action Battalion (RAB) security force has arrested 26 people, including a former parliamentarian, in connection with the theft.

“On the information of the arrested people we have found pieces at a rubbish dump on the outskirts of Dhaka,” said investigating officer Sohel Imtiaj.

Authorities said earlier the suspects admitted smashing the exhibits out of fear of being found with them.

“So far we have recovered 46 broken pieces of the stolen artefacts, about 30 per cent of the two statues,” said acting keeper of the National Museum Shawpan Kumar Biswas.

“If we find all the pieces we are optimistic that it might be possible to reconstruct the statues,” he added.

A first consignment of 42 items was sent to Paris on Dec 1.

Plans for the exhibition had earlier attracted controversy in Bangladesh art circles, with a small group of curators and fine arts professors claiming France would never return the objects. The French government had strongly rejected the claims.—AFP