According to French daily Le Parisien, the criminals gained access through the façade of the museum facing the Seine River, where construction work is underway. Using a construction ladder and a freight elevator, they reached the Galerie d’Apollon, home to the French Crown Jewels, before breaking through windows and seizing nine pieces from the historic collection.
French Interior Minister Laurent Nuñez described the incident as a “major robbery” that lasted just seven minutes. “It was manifestly a team that had done scouting,” he said, noting that the thieves used small chainsaws and a disc cutter to cut through panes of glass before fleeing on scooters.
Culture Minister Rachida Dati confirmed the theft in a post on X, saying a “robbery” had occurred at the museum as it opened to the public. “No injuries have been reported,” she added, assuring that investigations were underway. The Louvre subsequently announced its closure for “exceptional reasons,” and police evacuated visitors from the premises as nearby streets were cordoned off.
Authorities later recovered one of the stolen jewellery pieces near the museum, but the rest remain missing.
The targeted Galerie d’Apollon holds some of France’s most valuable treasures, including the Crown Jewels and ornate objects associated with the country’s imperial past. The stolen pieces, part of the Napoleonic collection, are considered “priceless” by officials due to their historical significance.
The audacious theft has reignited concerns about museum security across Europe, following a string of high-profile art crimes in recent years. In 2019, thieves broke into Dresden’s Green Vault in Germany, escaping with royal jewels worth hundreds of millions of euros. Two years earlier, burglars at Berlin’s Bode Museum made off with a 100-kilogram gold coin, while in 2010 a lone intruder at Paris’s Museum of Modern Art slipped away with five masterpieces, including a Picasso.
The Louvre itself is no stranger to daring robberies. The most famous case occurred in 1911 when Leonardo da Vinci’s Mona Lisa was stolen by an Italian handyman who hid inside the museum overnight and walked out with the painting under his coat. It was recovered two years later in Florence, an episode that helped turn the portrait into the world’s most recognised artwork.
Louvre is home to more than 33,000 works ranging from ancient artefacts to European masterpieces and draws up to 30,000 visitors a day.
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