Cyprus police said Monday they had broken up an antiquities theft ring negotiating a ¤11 million ($15.5 million) deal to sell artifacts dating as far back as 2,000 B.C. Police spokesman Michalis Katsounotos said 10 Cypriots had been arrested and another five, including a Syrian man, were being sought in the case, believed to be the largest of its kind in the Mediterranean island's history.The suspects face charges of illegally possessing and trading in antiquities. Cyprus Antiquities Curator Maria Hadjicosti told the Associated Press the artifacts include copper and silver coins, terra-cotta urns and clay and limestone figurines believed to date from the Copper Age to around 400 B.C. Most of the artifacts are urns primarily found around the southern coastal towns of Limassol and Paphos, she said. Some of the coins could date to Hellenistic and Roman times. Excavations on Cyprus have uncovered settlements dating back to around 9000 B.C. Cyprus then saw successive waves of colonization, including Phoenicians, Mycenaean Greeks, Romans and, in the Middle Ages, Franks and Venetians. The island was conquered by Ottoman Turks in 1571 and became part of the British Empire in 1878 before winning independence in 1960.
