Germany rejects Egypt's demand to send Nefertiti home

Germany regards the exquisite painted bust of the Egyptian queen Nefertiti as one of its national treasures, and Egypt's dreams that she will return home one day - even on loan - are unlikely to come true, The National reported.

The 3,350-year old artwork, discovered by German archaeologists in 1912, is the foremost piece in the city's recently rebuilt cultural showpiece, the Neues Museum, where she attracted 1.2 million visitors last year. She is to the German capital what the Mona Lisa is to Paris, only more so. Her startlingly timeless beauty and grace are appreciated all the more in this often grey city that still bears the scars of war.

So it came as no surprise that German officials swiftly and firmly rejected the latest demand on Monday by Zahi Hawass, the head of Egypt's Supreme Council of Antiquities, that the bust be handed back. They denied his claim that a top German archaeologist had obtained Nefertiti by cheating Egyptian officials.

A spokesman for Bernd Neumann, the German culture minister, said on Monday: "Documents clearly prove that the Prussian state obtained the bust of Nefertiti legally and that Egypt has no legal claim to it."

German officials insisted that Hawass' letter did not amount to a formal request by the Egyptian government.

Hermann Parzinger, the president of Prussian Cultural Heritage Foundation, which manages Berlin's state-run museums, said the letter had not been signed by the Egyptian prime minister, Ahmed Nazif, and was therefore not official.

"The bust is and remains Egypt's best ambassador in Berlin," said Mr Parzinger, adding vaguely that his foundation was drafting ideas for co-operation with Egypt and would be proposing them to Mr Hawass. That is unlikely to satisfy Egypt, which has been demanding the return of Nefertiti ever since she first went on display in Berlin in 1923.