The Louvre has transferred some of its most precious jewels to the Bank of France after a spectacular daylight heist exposed woeful flaws in museum’s security.
On Friday a secret police escort oversaw the transfer of some of the remaining jewels to the Bank, 500m (about 500 yards ) from the museum, French media report.
They will now be stored in the Bank’s most secure vault, 26m (85ft) below the ground floor of its elegant headquarters in central Paris.
The vault is home to 90% of France’s gold reserves, as well as the notebooks of Leonardo Da Vinci and other national treasures. Its contents are worth an estimated €600m (£520m).
The “Souterraine”, as the vault is known, was designed to withstand all attacks, according to the bank’s website.
The main shaft is protected by a 50cm-thick, seven-tonne door made of flame-resistant concrete and reinforced with steel.
Behind this door is a 35-tonne rotating concrete turret, which the bank says “prevents any possibility of forced entry”.
Last Sunday, masked thieves used an angle grinder to smash through a reinforced window into the Louvre’s Gallery of Apollo, where France’s crown jewels are kept.
Within eight minutes, the gang seized treasures, including a necklace that belonged to Napoleon’s wife Empress Marie-Louise and a diadem of Napoleon III’s wife Empress Eugenie, worth €88m (£77m).
The thieves used a mechanical ladder on the back of a lorry to lift them to a first-floor balcony to gain entry to the gallery.
Interior Minister Laurent Nunez has said he has “every confidence” the thieves would be caught.
Although French ministers insist security at the museum had worked properly on the day, the Louvre director, Laurence des Cars, has spoken of weak and “aging” infrastructure.
On Wednesday, des Cars told French lawmakers that the sole security camera monitoring the exterior wall where the break-in took place was facing the wrong way.
