Russian police foil Chagall painting smugglers

MOSCOW (Reuters) – Russian police have foiled plans to
smuggle a Marc Chagall painting worth an estimated $1 million
abroad, local media reported on Tuesday, citing art police in
St. Petersburg.

The painting, known in Russian as “Khasid,” was stolen in
2001 from a private collection in Russia along with six other
paintings.

St. Petersburg police raided an expensive restaurant in the
city where the work by the Russian master was about to be
handed to a smuggler who intended to take the picture abroad,
the Interfax news agency reported.

The smuggling of art treasures from Russia boomed after the
fall of the Soviet Union, with criminal gangs raiding some of
the world’s top museums for lucrative export markets in Europe
and the United States.