Germany and the Netherlands to Return 2,000 Ghanaian Artifacts After Accra Conference
Germany and the Netherlands have agreed to return 2,000 culturally significant artifacts to Ghana, a move announced in Accra during a conference designed to turn a recent United Nations declaration into concrete policy. The decision was unveiled at Next Steps, a gathering hosted last week by Ghanaian president John Dramani Mahama in the capital.
The conference followed the United Nations’ March 25, 2026 declaration that the trafficking of enslaved Africans and the racialized system of chattel enslavement that followed constituted the “gravest crime against humanity.” Organizers framed Next Steps as an effort to convert that language into “a common framework of actionable commitments for a just and equitable world order.”
On June 20, Samuel Okudzeto Ablakwa, Ghana’s foreign minister, said in a Facebook post that ambassadors from Germany and the Netherlands attended the conference and presented President Mahama with a catalogue of the objects slated for return. He did not identify the artifacts or say where they are currently held. According to 3 News, details on the timeline for the physical transfer, as well as plans for how the works will be received and displayed in Ghana, are expected later.
Ablakwa also said Denmark’s foreign minister apologized for the country’s role in the transatlantic slave trade and pledged support for preserving the castles built by Danes, describing the gesture as part of an effort to prevent historical erasure, promote truth telling, and guarantee non-repetition.
The announcement comes as Ghana has intensified pressure on European governments to return objects removed during the colonial era. In 2024, an exhibition at Manhyia Palace in Kumasi presented Asante-related objects that had recently come back to Ghana after roughly 150 years abroad.
The Netherlands, meanwhile, has been moving more visibly toward restitution from its own museum holdings. In 2025, it agreed to return 113 Benin bronzes from the Dutch State Collection to Nigeria. Soon after the opening of the Grand Egyptian Museum in Giza, the Dutch prime minister also announced plans to return a 3,500-year-old Pharaonic bust to Egypt. Together, the decisions suggest a broader shift in how European governments are confronting the legacy of colonial collecting and the demands now reshaping museum diplomacy.
