Argentine President Cristina Fernández de Kirchner has announced that over 4,000 archaeological artifacts will be returned from her country to Ecuador and Peru.

"We are doing something unusual, really special," said Fernández during a ceremony at the National Museum of Fine Art in Buenos Aires, as reported in the BBC. Expressing her hopes that other countries would follow Argentina’s example, the President said, "It is an honour and a pleasure to restore the cultural wealth of countries such as Ecuador and Peru in a world where such wealth has so often been taken away."

Regarding the stolen works of art that abound in museums across the globe, Fernandez said, "One can see in the great museums of the world pieces from Greece, Syria, Egypt, Asia and even Latin America, and which have not been returned."

The artifacts Fernández spoke of had been taken from the Incan 15th century citadel of Machu Picchu by American explorer Hiram Bingham in 1912. The President did not say when the ancient artifacts would be returned.

Although the works that Fernández is proud to return are, as they are ancient, arguably part of a world heritage, Argentina is often at the center of more contemporary modern art heist-related stories.

In 2010, around 77 paintings and objets d'art valued at about $4 million were recovered by police in Argentina. As reported by Art Daily, among the recovered works were paintings by artists such as as Antonio Berni, Raul Soldi, and Lino Spilimbergo.

Wojciech Kowalski, a man who is tasked with negotiating the return of Polish art that was stolen by Nazi forces during WII, spoke to the Economist in 2014 about the complications involved in retrieving the purloined pieces, saying “There is no exact method. We receive information from collectors, auction houses, and sometimes our diplomatic service.”

Polish art, said Kowalski, had been found as far away from Poland as Argentina.