What do the Louvre jewellery heist and the theft of heritage copies of 19th-century Russian authors from several prestigious libraries in Paris and Lyon have in common? In both cases, the haul has yet to be found. But in the case of the books, the courts have only just delivered their verdict.
Six Georgians have been sentenced in Paris to terms ranging from an 18-month suspended sentence to seven years in prison for the theft of Russian literary classics. Among the items stolen were works by Alexander Pushkin, including a first edition of “Boris Godunov” (1825), as well as texts by Mikhail Lermontov and Nikolai Gogol, described as a “genuine theft of treasure” by the prosecutor, who in his submissions spoke of a “massive, organised operation, planned and carried out with meticulous care and cynicism”.
The case forms part of a wave of thefts targeting libraries across Europe since the launch of Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine in 2022, attributed to an organised network potentially linked to Moscow.
The six defendants, five men and one woman, were all found guilty in the night from Friday to Saturday of forming a criminal association with a view to committing an offence, with some also convicted of stealing cultural property on display.
According to the investigation, the thieves would go to libraries to consult rare works, which they photographed and measured before returning to replace them with virtually undetectable facsimiles. At the National Library of France (BnF) alone, the loss is estimated at 770,000 euros.
Two of them were tried in absentia, having already been arrested in Georgia, their country of origin, which does not extradite its nationals.
A pair identified as Mikheil Z. and Beqa T. had already been convicted and jailed in the Baltic states for similar offences and were temporarily handed over to France to stand trial.
Mikheil Z., 50, received the heaviest sentence: seven years in prison, together with a permanent ban from French territory once he has served his time. He had already been sentenced last year in Lithuania to three years and four months in prison for the organised theft of 19th-century publications valued at more than 600,000 euros.
Beqa T., 49, was sentenced to four years in prison, in addition to a previous term of three years and six months imposed in Estonia.
A bid to repatriate Russian cultural heritage?
These thefts, which have also affected Germany, Switzerland and the Czech Republic, led to the creation of a joint investigation team under the aegis of Europol and Eurojust, resulting in several arrests in 2024.
In June 2024, the Russian auction house Litfond, which specialises in rare antiquarian books, included in its catalogue a second edition of Alexander Pushkin’s poem “The Prisoner of the Caucasus”, matching a copy stolen from the National Library of France (BnF).
The auction house informed the French authorities that it had documents showing the book had been acquired from its owner in Russia between 2014 and 2015.
For French magistrates, these thefts may be part of a broader drive to repatriate Russian cultural heritage, against a backdrop of heightened tensions between Moscow and Europe since the invasion of Ukraine.
None of the stolen works has been recovered, but the lawyer for the National Library of France (BnF), Alexandre de Konn, quoted by AFP, said the institution “has not lost hope” of finding them.
Euronews asked the BnF for details of any security measures introduced or strengthened in its various spaces since these events, but had received no reply at the time of publication.