All legal and diplomatic measures have been taken to stop the sale of Egyptian artifacts in two auctions held by Toledo Museum of Art in the US State of Ohio this month, a senior antiquities official said on Thursday.

"The Antiquities Ministry has contacted the director generals of UNESCO and the International Council of Museums (ICOM) in this regard. Also, it is coordinating with the Foreign Ministry to notify the Egyptian embassy in the US about the issue," the general supervisor of a committee on recovered antiquities, Shaaban Abdel Gawad, said in statements.

The official asserted that the ministry has been exerting strenuous efforts to lift the Egyptian pieces from the list of the two auctions and stop their sale.

Recently, the Egyptian Antiquities Ministry has succeeded in recovering 1,200 artifacts that were stolen from museums and smuggled abroad.