PARIS: French authorities have detained two of the suspected robbers believed to have stolen precious crown jewels from the Louvre in a museum heist that stunned the world, officials said on Sunday.

A swarm of investigators had been mobilised to track down the thieves who robbed the world-renowned museum in broad daylight on Oct 19, making off with jewellery worth an estimated $102 million in just a few minutes.

Paris prosecutor Laure Beccuau said they had “carried out arrests on Saturday evening”.

“One of the men arrested was about to leave the country” from Paris-Charles de Gaulle airport, Beccuau said.

A source close to the case told AFP the man was about to board a plane for Algeria.

The second man had been detained not long afterward in the Paris region, media reports said.

The two men were taken into police custody on suspicion of organised theft and criminal conspiracy. They could be held up to 96 hours.

Beccuau deplored the public revelation of the arrests, first revealed in media reports, warning they “can only hinder the efforts of the 100 investigators mobilised” in the hunt for the jewels and the perpetrators.

Interior Minister Laurent Nunez also called for confidentiality while congratulating the investigators “who have worked tirelessly”, in a post on X (formerly Twitter).

In the heist last Sunday, the robbers clambered up the extendable ladder of a stolen movers’ truck and, using cutting equipment, broke into a first-floor gallery that houses royal gems. They dropped a diamond- and emerald-studded crown as they fled down the ladder and onto scooters, but managed to steal eight other pieces, include an emerald-and-diamond necklace that Napoleon Bonaparte gave his wife.

Published in Dawn, October 27th, 2025