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Priceless Ancient Golden Helmet Stolen from Dutch Museum Is Recovered

A police officer stands by a stolen artifact from Romania, the 2,500-year-old Cotofenesti helmet, recovered in Netherlands, is shown during a press conference in Assen, Netherlands, Thursday, April 2, 2026. (AP Photo/Aleksandar Furtula)
A police officer stands by a stolen artifact from Romania, the 2,500-year-old Cotofenesti helmet, recovered in Netherlands, is shown during a press conference in Assen, Netherlands, Thursday, April 2, 2026. (AP Photo/Aleksandar Furtula)
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Priceless Ancient Golden Helmet Stolen from Dutch Museum Is Recovered

A police officer stands by a stolen artifact from Romania, the 2,500-year-old Cotofenesti helmet, recovered in Netherlands, is shown during a press conference in Assen, Netherlands, Thursday, April 2, 2026. (AP Photo/Aleksandar Furtula)
A police officer stands by a stolen artifact from Romania, the 2,500-year-old Cotofenesti helmet, recovered in Netherlands, is shown during a press conference in Assen, Netherlands, Thursday, April 2, 2026. (AP Photo/Aleksandar Furtula)

A priceless ancient golden helmet from Romania stolen last year from a museum in the Netherlands has been recovered, Dutch authorities announced Thursday.

Under the guard of heavily armed, balaclava-clad police, prosecutors unveiled the 2,500-year-old Cotofenesti helmet, one of Romania’s most revered national treasures from the Dacia civilization, during a news conference in the eastern Dutch city of Assen.

“We are incredibly pleased,” Corien Fahner of the prosecution service told reporters. “It has been a roller-coaster. Especially for Romania, but also for employees of the Drents Museum.”

The helmet was on display at the small museum in January 2025, the last weekend of a six-month-long exhibition, when thieves broke in and grabbed it, along with three golden wristbands.

There were fears the helmet may have been melted down because its fame and dramatic studded appearance made it virtually unsellable.

Two of three missing armbands were also recovered as part of a deal prosecutors reached with three men arrested for the heist shortly after it occurred. Their trial will begin later in April.

Fahner said the search for the remaining armband would continue.

The helmet did not return unscathed.

“The helmet is slightly dented, but there will be no permanent damage,” Drents Museum director Robert van Langh said during the news conference. “The armbands are in perfect condition.”

Thieves used a homemade firework bomb and sledgehammer to break into the museum. Grainy security video distributed by police after the raid appeared to show three people opening a museum door with a large crowbar, followed by an explosion.

The theft put a strain on relations between the Netherlands and Romania

Romanian Justice Minister Radu Marinescu last year called the incident a “crime against our state” and said recovering the artifacts “is an absolute priority.”

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Culture

Literature Commission Inaugurates Saudi Pavilion at Beijing International Book Fair 2026

The participation reflects Saudi Arabia's growing presence in the global publishing industry and its efforts to strengthen cultural ties with China. (SPA)
The participation reflects Saudi Arabia's growing presence in the global publishing industry and its efforts to strengthen cultural ties with China. (SPA)
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Literature Commission Inaugurates Saudi Pavilion at Beijing International Book Fair 2026

The participation reflects Saudi Arabia's growing presence in the global publishing industry and its efforts to strengthen cultural ties with China. (SPA)
The participation reflects Saudi Arabia's growing presence in the global publishing industry and its efforts to strengthen cultural ties with China. (SPA)

Saudi Arabia’s Literature, Publishing and Translation Commission inaugurated on Wednesday the Kingdom’s pavilion at the Beijing International Book Fair 2026 that runs through June 21, reported the Saudi Press Agency.

The participation reflects Saudi Arabia's growing presence in the global publishing industry and its efforts to strengthen cultural ties with China.

CEO of the commission Dr. Abdullatif Al-Wasel said the pavilion aims to introduce Saudi literary and intellectual production to Asian audiences, highlight developments in the Kingdom's literature, publishing, and translation sectors, and raise awareness of the Saudi cultural scene through an accompanying program featuring panel discussions and poetry evenings with Saudi writers and intellectuals.

The commission also seeks to strengthen the presence of Saudi publishers in international forums and build professional partnerships with stakeholders in China's publishing industry, supporting opportunities for translation exchange and cultural cooperation, he added.

Culture

Louvre Museum ‘Running Out of Steam’, Says New Director

This photograph shows visitors, seen from the Sully wing, queuing in the Cour Napoleon by the pyramid designed by Chinese-US architect Ieoh Ming Pei, to enter the Louvre Museum in Paris on November 19, 2025. (AFP)
This photograph shows visitors, seen from the Sully wing, queuing in the Cour Napoleon by the pyramid designed by Chinese-US architect Ieoh Ming Pei, to enter the Louvre Museum in Paris on November 19, 2025. (AFP)
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Louvre Museum ‘Running Out of Steam’, Says New Director

This photograph shows visitors, seen from the Sully wing, queuing in the Cour Napoleon by the pyramid designed by Chinese-US architect Ieoh Ming Pei, to enter the Louvre Museum in Paris on November 19, 2025. (AFP)
This photograph shows visitors, seen from the Sully wing, queuing in the Cour Napoleon by the pyramid designed by Chinese-US architect Ieoh Ming Pei, to enter the Louvre Museum in Paris on November 19, 2025. (AFP)

The Louvre museum is struggling to find funding to upgrade its ageing facilities, its new director said Wednesday, following a litany of problems that included a brazen $100-million jewellery heist.

"Despite its imposing majesty, despite the daily commitment of its staff, the Louvre is running out of steam," Christophe Leribault told a Senate committee.

"Its equipment and infrastructure are reaching the end of their life cycle."

Leribault, an art historian and museum director specializing in 18th-century art, took the helm in February, after his predecessor stepped down following an embarrassing daylight theft of imperial jewels in October that laid bare severe security failings.

Home to iconic pieces of art including Leonardo da Vinci's "Mona Lisa", the Louvre is the world's most visited museum, receiving around nine million visitors a year.

It is housed in a vast palace in central Paris on the banks of the Seine River, built over centuries by various French monarchs who at times used it as their official residence.

"Building-related emergencies are piling up, and we're facing a wall in terms of investments," Leribault said.

The museum had struggled with repeated strikes causing loss of revenue, a ticket fraud scheme that may have cost the museum 10 million euros ($11.7 million), a water leak, and other maintenance issues.

Culture

Monumental Cave Art on Paris’ Oldest Bridge Finally Opens, as the Public Steps and Sniffs Inside

Visitors walk into the artwork "The Pont Neuf Cave" by French street artist JR on the Pont Neuf bridge, Tuesday, June 16, 2026, in Paris, open to the public from June 15 to 28. (AP)
Visitors walk into the artwork "The Pont Neuf Cave" by French street artist JR on the Pont Neuf bridge, Tuesday, June 16, 2026, in Paris, open to the public from June 15 to 28. (AP)
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Monumental Cave Art on Paris’ Oldest Bridge Finally Opens, as the Public Steps and Sniffs Inside

Visitors walk into the artwork "The Pont Neuf Cave" by French street artist JR on the Pont Neuf bridge, Tuesday, June 16, 2026, in Paris, open to the public from June 15 to 28. (AP)
Visitors walk into the artwork "The Pont Neuf Cave" by French street artist JR on the Pont Neuf bridge, Tuesday, June 16, 2026, in Paris, open to the public from June 15 to 28. (AP)

For weeks, a black mountain loomed over the Seine where Paris’ oldest bridge should have been. On Monday evening, its doors finally opened.

Inside, Paris smells different. The air carries the scent of earth after rain — damp ancient stone, cellar walls, perhaps a trace of smoke.

Visitors step from the bright riverfront into a dark passage lined with glowing photographs of caves, as a low electronic pulse seems to breathe through the walls.

Beneath it all, the old cobblestones of the Pont Neuf rise and fall underfoot.

The Pont Neuf Cavern, a monumental installation by French street artist JR — also known as the French Banksy — is free to enter around the clock through June 28.

Made largely from printed fabric and air, it transforms the 17th-century bridge into an artificial cavern rising 18 meters (59 feet) above the Seine.

“It feels like the city has disappeared,” said Léa Martin, a 22-year-old art student from Lyon on Tuesday. “You know the river is right outside, but for a moment you’re somewhere ancient.”

Paris steps in and sniffs history

The smell is central to the illusion.

Olfactory expert Sarah Bouasse created two shifting scents: drawing on geosmin and isoborneol, compounds associated with the aroma released when rain strikes dry earth.

It changes along the crossing: first wet earth and mineral dampness, then something warmer, smokier and faintly animal.

“Usually I cross here without looking up once,” said Michel Dupré, a 67-year-old retiree, blinking as he emerged into daylight. “Today I felt the stones under my feet. And smelled them too. It makes you walk like a child again.”

A sound installation by Thomas Bangalter, formerly of the French electronic duo Daft Punk, accompanies the work, filling the cavern with low rumbles, echoes and pulses.

Completed in 1607, the Pont Neuf — despite its name, “New Bridge” — is the oldest bridge still standing in Paris.

JR’s installation asks people to experience the familiar crossing through their noses, ears and feet.

It also pays tribute to Christo and Jeanne-Claude, whose 1985 wrapping of the bridge in pale golden fabric drew an estimated 3 million visitors.

Their work covered the Pont Neuf in light.

The dark side JR sends visitors into darkness.

“You enter into the darkness,” he has said, “and emerge into the light on the other side.”

Visitors can also raise their phones to activate an augmented-reality experience developed with tech company Snap.

Digital bats trail light through the cave, passing bodies leave ghostly traces and a dancer materializes in space.

JR has linked the work to Plato’s allegory of the cave, in which prisoners mistake shadows for reality. Today’s cave walls, he argues, are screens and the algorithms that shape what people see. Yet the installation’s strongest effects require no phone.

“It’s completely strange,” said Nadia Benali, 34, smiling beside the artificial cliffs. “Paris needs things that make people stop.”

When the cave closes, its fabric will be reused or recycled.

The mountain will vanish, traffic will return and the Pont Neuf — older than the French Revolution — will emerge into the light once more.