Durov offers to buy stolen Louvre jewels

The Telegram founder said he would donate the artifacts to a museum in Abu Dhabi

Telegram founder Pavel Durov has offered to buy the French crown jewels stolen from the Louvre.

On Sunday, four thieves broke into Paris’ most famous museum in broad daylight and ran off with eight artifacts, including necklaces, earrings, and a tiara owned by 19th-century royals.

“Happy to buy the stolen jewelry and donate it back to the Louvre. I mean Louvre Abu Dhabi, of course; no one steals from Louvre Abu Dhabi,” the Russian-born tech entrepreneur, who lives in Dubai, wrote on X on Tuesday.

Opened in 2017, the Louvre Abu Dhabi on Saadiyat Island is a joint project between France and the UAE.

Durov said he was “not at all surprised” by the Paris heist. “It’s another sad sign of the decline of a once-great country, where the government has perfected the art of distracting people with phantom threats instead of confronting the real ones,” he wrote.

Not at all surprised by the Louvre heist. It’s another sad sign of the decline of a once great country — where the government has perfected the art of distracting people with phantom threats instead of confronting the real ones.

— Pavel Durov (@durov) October 20, 2025

Durov has previously accused the French government of trying to force him to impose political censorship on Telegram. Last year, he was detained at a Paris airport on charges of failing to remove illegal content from his platform before being released on bail.