RUSSIA: Russia's Hermitage Museum reports theft of artwork worth more than 5 million U.S. dollars

Officials from Russia's world famous Hermitage Museum said on Tuesday (August 1) that police had launched a criminal investigation into the disappearance, and apparent theft of more than 220 exhibits, jewellery and enamelled objects, worth around 5 million U.S. dollars. "The investigation is carried out with the help of the 9th Antiques Department of the criminal police. In the first stage they will focus on, and I am reading to you the police document, in the first stage they will focus on determining the time when the exhibits disappeared and also on narrowing the number of people who could be connected with the crime. The list of stolen exhibits will be reported to the main information centre of Russia's interior ministry and to Interpol," Mikhail Piotrovsky, director of the state Hermitage Museum told reporters at a news conference on Tuesday. But Piotrovsky gave few other details about the investigation or the items stolen, which were discovered missing during a routine inventory check. Earlier, the museum said the curator in charge of most of the collection where the theft occurred died suddenly at his workplace when the check began, and that his colleagues had discovered the items were missing. The Hermitage's vast collection, which includes antiquities, decorative art and western art, including world-renowned collections of Impressionist and Flemish paintings, was started by Catherine the Great in 1764. It is housed in the former Winter Palace of the Russian Tsars in St.Petersburg, on the banks of the river Neva.

ITN Source | August 2, 2006

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