Elephant tusk thief arrested

Man caught with sawn-off tusk taken from skeleton at Paris natural history museum

A PARIS man has been arrested on suspicion of breaking into a museum with a chainsaw and making off with an elephant's tusk.

The elephant, on show at the city's natural history museum, was given to Louis XIV by the king of Portugal in 1668.

Security staff called police after a chainsaw set off the alarm in the palaeontology department on Saturday night.

Reports say a 20-year-old man was arrested in possession of the sawn-off tusk in a neighbouring road as he left the museum.

The man is believed to have broken in to the building through an open window. He is said to have injured in himself when trying to flee the museum.