Antwerp Vault Heist Leaves Clients in the Dark

RAPAPORT... Thieves have broken into a bank vault near Antwerp's diamonddistrict, with some clients in the dark about whether their goods have beenstolen. Daring burglars entered the BNP Paribas Fortissecure area via a sewage pipe on Sunday, emptying about 30 deposit boxes,according to local media. The bank and local police couldn't say whether any diamondswere stolen. Clients were lining up at the branch on the city's Belgi?<Rapaport News Tuesday. Insurance providers require all customers to declare everythingthey had in the vault before the lender can divulge what was stolen. On Monday,the insurers agreed to let the bank formally identify an unaffected zone of thevault, enabling it to tell customers whose items were in that area that theirbelongings were safe, explained Isabelle Marchand, a spokesperson for theBelgian Financial Sector Federation. The bank is now contacting clients whose valuables were inthe affected segment, known as the "perimeter," requesting them to declare thecontents of their lockers. "Only when all these clients which have a safe in thisperimeter have done their declarations will they start to inform the customerswhich safes have been broken, or which goods have been stolen," Marchand added. Police received a call at 1:44 p.m. Sunday reporting aburglary in the bank's vault room. When the authorities arrived, they found thedoor to the vault locked, even though the alarm was sounding, police said.Staff members let the police into the room, at which point they found a hole inthe floor that led to sewers under Belgi?<Image: The BNP Paribas Fortis branch on Belgi?<Wikimedia Commons)