WASHINGTON: More than 10,000 artifacts remain missing from Iraq’s National Museum five months after a spree of looting that coincided with the capture of Baghdad by US forces, but more than 3,400 other stolen items have been recovered, the US military said on Wednesday.

Marine Col. Matthew Bogdanos, a New York City homicide prosecutor who is leading the team investigating the museum’s losses, attributed the losses to a combination of professional thieves with knowledge of antiquities, thieves working with inside information only available to museum staff, and local looters.

Unveiling his report to US Central Command on the looting, Bogdanos said thieves hoping to profit from the world’s black market on valuable antiquities had taken numerous items out of Iraq. He said more than 750 artifacts had already been recovered in Britain, the United States, Italy and Jordan.

US forces were sharply rebuked by critics after the looting for failing to protect the museum. The US military said that the looting took place during a time of active fighting in the Iraqi capital.

“The majority of the work remaining, that of tracking down the missing pieces, will likely take years,” Bogdanos told a Pentagon briefing.

The museum, considered among the elite in the world, housed a collection including priceless artifacts from ancient Mesopotamia including the Sumerian period and the later Greek and Roman periods, as well as fabulous items from Islamic culture.—Reuters