Vienna Museum Heist: Historic Egyptian Queen's 673-Diamond Necklace Worth $4.3 Million Stolen

(MENAFN- Live Mint) Austrian police have launched a manhunt for two men who stole a historic 200-carat platinum necklace encrusted with 673 diamonds from the Museum of Applied Arts (MAK) in Vienna, The Guardian reported. The piece, which once belonged to Egyptian royalty, was on loan to the institution when the daytime raid occurred.

Security camera images of the unmasked suspects, who purchased exhibition tickets before shattering a glass display case with a hammer on Thursday afternoon during opening hours, have been released by the authorities.

Appealing to the public for information, the police said:“The perpetrators fled with the jewellery in an unknown direction.”

Officers and police tracking dogs were deployed across the city centre to search for the suspects. According to the Kronen newspaper, investigators suspect the robbery was likely a“contract job” carried out for a criminal gang.

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The necklace was part of a major jewellery exhibition that has been running since June, featuring more than 300 works from the Parisian jewellery house Van Cleef & Arpels alongside roughly 200“unique and rarely seen objects” from the MAK's own collection.

Although several witnesses were present in the room during the heist, no one was injured, the news outlet said.

Following the theft, the MAK temporarily closed the exhibition-which was scheduled to conclude on 27 September-and cancelled a guided tour planned for Friday afternoon.

According to exhibition documentation, the necklace originally belonged to Queen Consort Nazli of Egypt, who wore it to the 1939 wedding of her daughter, Fawzia, to Iran's then-crown prince (later shah) Mohammad Reza Pahlavi.

The piece was previously sold at Sotheby's in New York in 2015 for $4.3 million and was loaned from the Van Cleef & Arpels patrimonial collection, spanning the luxury brand's 120-year history.

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The heist comes amid a rash of high-profile smash-and-grab thefts targeting cultural institutions across Europe:

France: Thieves raided the Louvre in Paris during daytime hours last October, making off with €88 million in crown jewels within minutes. Spain: Burglars targeted the Treasure of Villena on Thursday, raiding one of Europe's most significant prehistoric Bronze Age gold hoards. Italy (Messina): Four major 15th-century works by Renaissance master Antonello da Messina were stolen from a museum during a national holiday earlier this month. Italy (Parma): Italian police recently recovered three paintings by Paul Cézanne, Pierre-Auguste Renoir, and Henri Matisse stolen from a private museum near Parma earlier this year.

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A Europol report published this month warned that museum robberies across the continent are growing increasingly violent, noting that perpetrators have brandished firearms, assaulted staff, and deployed axes, sledgehammers, and explosives to secure their loot.

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