One of the more egregious acts of antiquities theft was the removal of an obelisk dating back to the Axumite kingdom from the ancient city of Axum by Mussolini. It is in the process of being returned, seven decades later.

A teenage Abebe Alenayehu watched Italian soldiers haul away Axum's revered obelisk nearly seven decades ago and never thought he would live to see its return.

But if the weather cooperates, he will see the dream he shares with his nation come true Tuesday when a giant cargo plane returns the 82-foot monument's top section to this wind-swept town that was the seat of the ancient Axumite Kingdom.

"The memory still leaves a bitter taste in my mouth," Abebe said about the loss of a monument that Ethiopians consider the symbol of their nation. "Every day for the last 67 years I have thought about the obelisk."

The Italian Foreign Ministry said Monday that the two other pieces of the 176-ton obelisk should be back by the end of April. Lattanzi, the Italian company organizing the return, says no one has attempted to fly such a massive monument before.

Abebe, 81, vividly recalls the day the masterpiece of the Axum civilization was taken away and shipped to Rome.

"All the adults in the town were under curfew," he said. "But we played with the soldiers who gave us sweets and sugar. We didn't realize what was happening, but our parents were hiding their faces and crying."

The restoration of this ancient monument is a fitting end to the evils committed by Mussolini and his forces against the Ethiopian people during the occupation of their nation from 1936-1941. And it sounds like it will be even more of an engineering nightmare than its removal was in 1937.

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