Louvre installs bars over gallery window used by thieves in sensational heist

PARIS – The Louvre Museum installed metal bars on Dec 23 over the windows of the Apollo Gallery, where thieves broke into the Paris landmark to make off with crown jewels in a recent daylight robbery
.

“This is one of the emergency measures decided after the theft,” the museum’s deputy administrator, Mr Francis Steinbock, said.

Early in the morning, workers on the gallery balcony helped position a large grille hoisted by a crane to secure it to the gallery’s tall French door windows.

“We had committed to doing it before the end of the year,” Mr Steinbock said, adding that discussions were ongoing regarding “securing the other windows”.

Louvre director Laurence des Cars told lawmakers last week that a grille would be reinstalled “before Christmas”, noting that one had been removed in 2003–2004 during restoration work on the Apollo Gallery.

The bars are the latest measure put in place in recent months as the security standards at the world’s most visited museum in Paris are facing intense scrutiny following the October heist when thieves stole jewellery worth an estimated US$102 million (S$131 million).

A police unit has been deployed at the museum and a project for increased video surveillance
is under way, Mr Steinbock said.

Last week, the Louvre also announced the completion of anti-intrusion measures around the museum.

The Oct 19 robbery saw the thieves park a truck with an extendable ladder below the Apollo Gallery housing the French crown jewels.

They clambered up, broke a window and used angle grinders to cut into glass display booths containing the treasures, which remain missing. AFP