News World 24: Three arrested over brazen masterpiece heist

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Updated January 23, 2013 08:23:52

Three people have been arrested on suspicion of involvement in a spectacular theft of seven masterpieces, including Monets and a Picasso, from a Dutch museum.

The paintings, worth hundreds of millions on the open market, were stolen from the Kunsthal museum in Rotterdam in October last year, the greatest such heist in 20 years.

Thieves made off with seven paintings, which also included a Gauguin, a Lucian Freud and a Meyer de Haan, thought to be worth tens of millions of dollars in a brazen and meticulously planned operation.

Rotterdam police spokeswoman Yvette van den Heerik says three arrests have been made in Romania in connection with the theft.

"They're still being detained and are being questioned about their possible role in the theft," she said.

"No painting has been recovered."

Romanian police say they "led operations in connection with the theft of paintings in the Netherlands", but refused to elaborate.

According to Romania's Mediafax news agency, the trio was detained at the request of the Romanian prosecutor's office dealing with terrorism and organised crime.

A district court made a ruling late on Monday allowing authorities to hold three men for 29 days, Mediafax reported, quoting judicial sources.

The Kunsthal museum has declined to comment on the arrests.

The brazen early-morning theft targeted the museum's most valuable pieces and was one of the art world's most dramatic in recent years.

The alarm sounded in the early hours of the morning but the thieves had gone by the time police arrived.

The works stolen were Pablo Picasso's Tete d'Arlequin; Henri Matisse's La Liseuse en Blanc et Jaune; Claude Monet's Waterloo Bridge, London, and Charing Cross Bridge, London; Paul Gauguin's Femme Devant une Fenetre Ouverte, dite La Fiancee; Meyer de Haan's Autoportrait; and Lucian Freud's Woman with Eyes Closed.