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DAMASCUS, Sept. 6 (Xinhua) -- Syrian authorities have secured 300,000 artifacts from archeological sites across Syria, the country's antiquities chief said.
Cited by the pro-government al-Watan newspaper Sunday, Maamoun Abdulkarim, the head of the antiquities and museums department in Damascus, said the secured artifacts include 400 statues from the ancient city of Palmyra in central Syria.
He added that 95 percent of the artifacts of Palmyra were secured.
Palmyra, Syria's millennia-old oasis city, was stormed by the Islamic State last May. Since then, several ancient temples and tombs have been destroyed.
Other reports said the secured artifacts have been relocated to safe areas inside the capital Damascus.
