PARIS // Around fifteen “battle-hardened” armed thieves attacked two heavily guarded vans carrying jewels at a French motorway toll station in the dead of night, making off with a haul worth around nine million euros (Dh35.1m), police said on Wednesday.
French police and other authorities were combing the Burgundy region south-east of Paris for the attackers, after what was the latest in a string of big jewel heists in France in recent years.
No one was injured in the midnight attack on the A6 motorway connecting Paris and Lyon, and the drivers of the two vans were left at the scene unharmed after being forced out of their vehicles. The toll booth itself was also not damaged, suggesting the work of professionals.
The perpetrators escaped in four cars and the two vans, which police found burnt and abandoned in a forest near the site of the heist. The jewels remain missing.
Attacks on armoured vehicles carrying jewels or cash often require special equipment such as explosives or assault rifles, and while they occurred regularly at the beginning of the 2000s in France, they have dwindled in recent years.
The last major such heist was in 2009 when armoured van driver Toni Musulin escaped with his vehicle after two of his colleagues stepped away, making off with at least 11.5 million euros in cash collected from a Bank of France building.
Musulin became an overnight internet sensation at a time when the super-rich were being blamed for the financial crisis.
Investigators soon found packets of cash totalling 9.11 million euros in a lock-up garage in the southeastern city of Lyon near where the abandoned van was found, and after some 10 days on the run, Musulin gave himself in.
The rest of the cash was never found.
Although attacks on armoured vehicles have dwindled in recent years however, big jewel heists have occurred in other scenarios.
In November, two gunmen robbed a Cartier jewellery boutique in a tourist-filled Paris neighbourhood, before fleeing police in a chase across the Seine River, taking a hostage, and then surrendering.
In 2013, the Cannes Film Festival was hit by two high-profile thefts. In the first, a gunman walked into a jewel show at the Carlton International Hotel, stole US$136 million (Dh499.5m) in loot, and then disappeared down a side street. In the second, two armed men made off with a haul of luxury watches on the same promenade.
Last month, eight people were convicted in connection with one of the most spectacular jewel thefts in recent French history at a Harry Winston boutique in Paris. In the 2008 hold-up, three cross-dressing gunmen stole about $92 million in goods.
* Associated Press and Agence France-Presse
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Mercer, the investment consulting arm of US services company Marsh & McLennan, expects its wealth division to at least double its assets under management (AUM) in the Middle East as wealth in the region continues to grow despite economic headwinds, a company official said.
Mercer Wealth, which globally has $160 billion in AUM, plans to boost its AUM in the region to $2-$3bn in the next 2-3 years from the present $1bn, said Yasir AbuShaban, a Dubai-based principal with Mercer Wealth.
“Within the next two to three years, we are looking at reaching $2 to $3 billion as a conservative estimate and we do see an opportunity to do so,” said Mr AbuShaban.
Mercer does not directly make investments, but allocates clients’ money they have discretion to, to professional asset managers. They also provide advice to clients.
“We have buying power. We can negotiate on their (client’s) behalf with asset managers to provide them lower fees than they otherwise would have to get on their own,” he added.
Mercer Wealth’s clients include sovereign wealth funds, family offices, and insurance companies among others.
From its office in Dubai, Mercer also looks after Africa, India and Turkey, where they also see opportunity for growth.
Wealth creation in Middle East and Africa (MEA) grew 8.5 per cent to $8.1 trillion last year from $7.5tn in 2015, higher than last year’s global average of 6 per cent and the second-highest growth in a region after Asia-Pacific which grew 9.9 per cent, according to consultancy Boston Consulting Group (BCG). In the region, where wealth grew just 1.9 per cent in 2015 compared with 2014, a pickup in oil prices has helped in wealth generation.
BCG is forecasting MEA wealth will rise to $12tn by 2021, growing at an annual average of 8 per cent.
Drivers of wealth generation in the region will be split evenly between new wealth creation and growth of performance of existing assets, according to BCG.
Another general trend in the region is clients’ looking for a comprehensive approach to investing, according to Mr AbuShaban.
“Institutional investors or some of the families are seeing a slowdown in the available capital they have to invest and in that sense they are looking at optimizing the way they manage their portfolios and making sure they are not investing haphazardly and different parts of their investment are working together,” said Mr AbuShaban.
Some clients also have a higher appetite for risk, given the low interest-rate environment that does not provide enough yield for some institutional investors. These clients are keen to invest in illiquid assets, such as private equity and infrastructure.
“What we have seen is a desire for higher returns in what has been a low-return environment specifically in various fixed income or bonds,” he said.
“In this environment, we have seen a de facto increase in the risk that clients are taking in things like illiquid investments, private equity investments, infrastructure and private debt, those kind of investments were higher illiquidity results in incrementally higher returns.”
The Abu Dhabi Investment Authority, one of the largest sovereign wealth funds, said in its 2016 report that has gradually increased its exposure in direct private equity and private credit transactions, mainly in Asian markets and especially in China and India. The authority’s private equity department focused on structured equities owing to “their defensive characteristics.”
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- JOKER - Bradley Cooper, Todd Phillips, Emma Tillinger Koskoff
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- THE IRISHMAN - Martin Scorsese
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- PARASITE - Bong Joon-ho
OUTSTANDING BRITISH FILM
- 1917 - Sam Mendes, Pippa Harris, Callum McDougall, Jayne-Ann Tenggren, Krysty Wilson-Cairns
- BAIT - Mark Jenkin, Kate Byers, Linn Waite
- FOR SAMA - Waad al-Kateab, Edward Watts
- ROCKETMAN - Dexter Fletcher, Adam Bohling, David Furnish, David Reid, Matthew Vaughn, Lee Hall
- SORRY WE MISSED YOU - Ken Loach, Rebecca O’Brien, Paul Laverty
- THE TWO POPES - Fernando Meirelles, Jonathan Eirich, Dan Lin, Tracey Seaward, Anthony McCarten
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- THE FAREWELL - Lulu Wang, Daniele Melia
- FOR SAMA - Waad al-Kateab, Edward Watts
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LEADING ACTOR
- LEONARDO DICAPRIO - Once Upon a Time… In Hollywood
- ADAM DRIVER - Marriage Story
- TARON EGERTON - Rocketman
- JOAQUIN PHOENIX - Joker
- JONATHAN PRYCE - The Two Popes
SUPPORTING ACTOR
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- BRAD PITT - Once Upon a Time… in Hollywood
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EE RISING STAR AWARD (voted for by the public)
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- THE IRISHMAN - Rodrigo Prieto
- JOKER - Lawrence Sher
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- THE LIGHTHOUSE - Jarin Blaschke
EDITING
- THE IRISHMAN - Thelma Schoonmaker
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- LITTLE WOMEN - Alexandre Desplat
- STAR WARS: THE RISE OF SKYWALKER - John Williams
SPECIAL VISUAL EFFECTS
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- THE IRISHMAN - Leandro Estebecorena, Stephane Grabli, Pablo Helman
- THE LION KING - Andrew R. Jones, Robert Legato, Elliot Newman, Adam Valdez
- STAR WARS: THE RISE OF SKYWALKER - Roger Guyett, Paul Kavanagh, Neal Scanlan, Dominic Tuohy
MAKE UP & HAIR
- 1917 - Naomi Donne
- BOMBSHELL - Vivian Baker, Kazu Hiro, Anne Morgan
- JOKER - Kay Georgiou, Nicki Ledermann
- JUDY - Jeremy Woodhead
- ROCKETMAN - Lizzie Yianni Georgiou
BRITISH SHORT FILM
- AZAAR - Myriam Raja, Nathanael Baring
- GOLDFISH - Hector Dockrill, Harri Kamalanathan, Benedict Turnbull, Laura Dockrill
- KAMALI - Sasha Rainbow, Rosalind Croad
- LEARNING TO SKATEBOARD IN A WARZONE (IF YOU’RE A GIRL) - Carol Dysinger, Elena Andreicheva
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BRITISH SHORT ANIMATION
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In numbers: PKK’s money network in Europe
Germany: PKK collectors typically bring in $18 million in cash a year – amount has trebled since 2010
Revolutionary tax: Investigators say about $2 million a year raised from ‘tax collection’ around Marseille
Extortion: Gunman convicted in 2023 of demanding $10,000 from Kurdish businessman in Stockholm
Drug trade: PKK income claimed by Turkish anti-drugs force in 2024 to be as high as $500 million a year
Denmark: PKK one of two terrorist groups along with Iranian separatists ASMLA to raise “two-digit million amounts”
Contributions: Hundreds of euros expected from typical Kurdish families and thousands from business owners
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This article is part of a guide on where to live in the UAE. Our reporters will profile some of the country’s most desirable districts, provide an estimate of rental prices and introduce you to some of the residents who call each area home.