Two British museums are returning gold and silver artifacts to Ghana under a long-term loan arrangement — 150 years after the items were looted from the Asante people during Britain’s colonial battles in West Africa.

The British Museum and the Victoria & Albert Museum in London, together with the Manhyia Palace Museum in Ghana, on Thursday announced the “important cultural’’ collaboration, which sidesteps U.K. laws that prohibit the return of cultural treasures to their countries of origin. Those laws have been used to prevent the British Museum from returning the Parthenon Marbles, also known as the Elgin Marbles, to Greece.

Some 17 items in total are involved in the loan arrangement, including 13 pieces of Asante royal regalia purchased by the V&A at auction in 1874. The items were acquired by the museums after they were looted by British troops during the Anglo-Asante wars of 1873-74 and 1895-96.