The Louvre reopened on Wednesday, three days after thieves stole royal jewels value €88 million throughout a surprising heist on the world famend museum.
Louvre Director Laurence des Vehicles is about to face a questioning by a cultural committee on the French Senate afterward Wednesday amid questions over the safety provisions on the world’s most visited museum.
Des Vehicles, who has run the Louvre since 2021, has not made any public assertion since thieves made off with royal jewels throughout a daylight theft on Sunday that took simply seven minutes.
Lack of safety
The theft reignited a row over the dearth of safety in French museums, after two different establishments had been hit final month.
“The Louvre curator estimated the damages to be €88 million,” Paris Prosecutor Laure Beccuau stated on Tuesday.
However she stated the larger loss was to France’s historic heritage, including that the thieves wouldn’t pocket the complete windfall if they’d “the very unhealthy thought of melting down these jewels”.
Scores of investigators are on the lookout for Sunday’s culprits, engaged on the speculation that it was an organised crime group that clambered up a ladder on a truck to interrupt into the museum, then dropped a diamond-studded crown as they fled.
Beccuau confirmed that 4 individuals had been concerned in Sunday’s theft and stated authorities had been analysing fingerprints discovered on the scene.
Detectives are scouring video digital camera footage from across the museum in addition to of most important highways out of Paris for indicators of the robbers, who escaped on scooters.
‘Worrying degree of obsolescence’
A report by France’s Courtroom of Auditors seen by AFP overlaying 2019 to 2024 pointed to a “persistent” delay in safety upgrades on the Louvre. Solely a fourth of 1 wing was coated by video surveillance.
In January, Des Vehicles had warned Tradition Minister Rachida Dati of a “worrying degree of obsolescence” on the museum, citing an pressing want for main renovations.
In Sunday’s heist, thieves parked a truck with an extendable ladder, like these continuously utilized by movers in Paris, under the museum’s Apollo Gallery shortly after it opened, climbing up and utilizing slicing tools to get by way of a window and open show instances to steal the jewelry.
They made off with eight priceless items, together with an emerald-and-diamond necklace that Napoleon I gave his spouse Empress Marie-Louise and a diadem that when belonged to the Empress Eugenie, which is dotted with practically 2 000 diamonds.
The museum on Tuesday hit again at criticism that the show instances defending the jewelry had been fragile, saying they had been put in in 2019 and “represented a substantial enchancment when it comes to safety”.
‘More and more focused’
Simply final month, criminals broke into Paris’s Pure Historical past Museum, making off with gold nuggets value greater than $1.5 million.
French authorities introduced on Tuesday {that a} 24-year-old Chinese language lady was detained in that case after she was arrested in Barcelona whereas attempting to eliminate practically one kilogram (2.2 kilos) of melted gold items.
Additionally final month, thieves stole two dishes and a vase from a museum within the central metropolis of Limoges, estimated at $7.6 million.
“Museums are more and more focused for the precious works they maintain,” in line with the Central Workplace for the Battle in opposition to Trafficking in Cultural Property.
Labour unions have complained that safety workers positions on the Louvre have been reduce, at the same time as attendance on the world-famous museum, whose in depth collections embrace the Mona Lisa, has soared.
“We can not do with out bodily surveillance,” a union official stated.
