Who's behind Europe's largest rare book heist?

0:00This BBC podcast is supported by ads outside the UK.

0:30us. And then we'll be learning about Francis Galton and the racist, discredited pseudoscience of eugenics with Desiree Birch. We'll meet many medieval saints in their bone boxes with Rachel Parrott. So if that sounds like your sort of thing, listen to You're Dead to Me wherever you get your podcasts. Thank you. Bye.

0:51Welcome to the documentary from the BBC World Service.

1:00Estás escuchando The Fifth Floor. The Fifth Floor, this is the fifth floor. This is The Fifth Floor, at the heart of global storytelling with BBC journalists from all around the world. I'm your host, Farnak Amidi.

1:28The University Library in Tartu in Estonia is a large brutalist complex surrounded by concrete water fountains and futuristic steel sculptures. But inside this unassuming building lies a hidden treasure, rare books worth thousands. In April 2022, some of these books were stolen. According to Europol, the European Law Enforcement Agency, this theft was part of a criminal operation that targeted national libraries in 12 countries, including the Baltic States, Poland, Finland, Germany, and France. It's been described as Europe's largest book heist since the Second World War. So, who was behind it?

2:21My colleague Nina Nazarova from BBC Russian has been investigating this story and she joins the fifth floor. Nina, great to have you back on the programme. Hello. So let's start, Nina, with the theft in Estonia. What do we know about it? What happened? So in April 2022, two men walked into the library and introduced themselves as Ukrainian refugees fleeing from the war. As you can remember, the war in Ukraine just started back then. So the older one told the librarians that he was helping the younger one with his university studies. And they asked for eight old editions of Russian offers. And they came back several times.

3:04But later, in August the same year, the librarians were doing a routine check of the books, and they noticed that the two original editions had been replaced with fakes. So the covers were copies of the original, but it was not the original, it was nicely made mock-ups. And they started to check the users' list, and it was these two men who read them the last. And until then, all of those months, nobody could tell the difference between the original ones and the copies. Yes, these were really meticulously done, forged copies. And it had the stamps, so that's the basic identification markers of library books.

3:46So it was easy to take them as real. And just for context, describe how the system works, because I don't think you can just walk into a library and take one of these precious books. rare books and just take them home just like any other book? No, it's normally in libraries that are like rare book sections. And ideally, they have a specific procedure. You have to first apply to get them issued. And then normally people would read them in the reading room with some librarians watching over. That's how it's supposed to work. But in some libraries, there is no such strict control. Or probably they sometimes allow, if you provide an identification, they allow you to take these books to read at home.

4:37All libraries have different rules and some are milder and some allow you to work more freely with these rare editions. So were these thieves targeting specific books? What were they taking? Yes, that's actually very interesting because there are lots of rare editions in the libraries, obviously, but they were targeting very specific authors. of Russian golden era. And this term usually applies to early 19th century. So it's books by Alexander Pushkin, Nikolai Gogol, Mikhail Lermontov. Probably they are less known in the world than Tolstoy and Dostoyevsky, but in Russia they are considered the very best that Russian literature produced over centuries.

5:22And the lifetime editions, first lifetime editions especially, are extremely valuable. Can you explain what a lifetime edition is? It's an edition published during the lifetime of the author. These are books which he himself supervised or made ready for printing, and they were published while he was still alive. Actually, both Pushkin and Lermanov died very young at duels, and this makes these lifetime editions even more valuable. Like when you say valuable, how much are they worth? Well, it depends on the particular edition and how well it is being preserved. For instance, the damage from stolen books in Tartu was estimated at 150 ,000 euros.

6:09And in that library in Warsaw, the collective damage were more than 500 ,000 euros. So it's the price of apartment or a very expensive car. That's a lot of money for books. Yes. So who started investigating these crimes? These crimes took place for a year and a half in a dozen countries. And it took the efforts of Europol, the EU law enforcement agency, to investigate all these. So police of different countries collaborated with each other. And the codename for the investigation was Operation Pushkin. Very well suited. Yes, named after Alexander Pushkin. So what did they find out? who was behind all of this?

6:55So they arrested nine persons. And interestingly, all of them were Georgian nationals who spoke Russian, obviously. And one of the men who was sentenced for three crimes in two countries was a person I spoke to. He's currently in a state of prison and his name is Beka Tsurikitsa. So were they all working together? We cannot say this because he is sentenced now and his son and his daughter-in-law are also sentenced in Georgia for the same book theft by the different libraries. But he denies that he knows other people who were arrested. So we cannot prove it that he was the gang leader, but he was very active.

7:39As you mentioned, you did speak to him. You were able to call him in prison. Where is he held in prison and what was the conversation like? What kind of person is he? So he is currently in Estonian prison. And in Estonia, prisons allow you to talk to journalists. And he is quite a character. He is very polite and he has a sense of humor. And he's very open, I would say. What did he tell you about his life, his early life? Who is he? He's a Georgian. He grew up in Abkhazia region and later lived in Kutaisi. he experienced poverty as a child and teenager because it was the years right before the fall of the Soviet Union and after and he even told me that the hungry child once he forged a bread stamp because there were bread stamps back then in some parts of Georgia he put it on a working lamp and just copied it and later he worked as a teacher at school in Georgia and apparently he was not satisfied with his salary as a teacher.

8:50And he started working with old books. He started restoring them, cleaning them, and selling for profit. So he bought an old book, cleaned it, restored it, and sold for profit. Some people who later probably took the books to Russia because that's the main market for them, and resold the books there. And he's very proud of his work with books. And he told me literally that, I'm quoting, I'm like a wizard with books. I can hold a book in my hand and immediately tell you how much it's worth and how much they might pay at auction. So you mentioned that he takes pride in his craft and what he does, kind of.

9:31But does he consider what he does a crime? No, I mean, restoring books isn't a crime. But obviously, stealing the books is a crime. And he was found guilty in three cases in two countries, first in Latvia and then in Estonia. I assume you got to talk to him about the theft in Estonia. What did he have to tell you about it? What had happened? Yes. Beka Cerkitsa told me that he went to Tartu Library with his nephew and that he was helping the nephew with his research in court. Officially, he admitted partially his guilt. and when talking to me he denied even seeing his nephew still and in Tallinn he actually did admit his guilt in court and talking to me he indeed took 10 rare books and never told them and it was just him there so he could not deny it but another very interesting thing happened in Latvia it's a neighboring country He was charged and convicted with aiding and abetting theft.

10:42And the prosecution said that he wasn't acting alone. So first, several months before, Tsirikitsa went to the library and ordered some books and took pictures and checked them. And after that, he came again and lived in the same hotel room with another man who actually went to the library and took the books. the same books Tsirikitsa was checking out before, so told them. And some months after that, Tsirikitsa was detained by Latvian authorities and he was charged with aiding the crime, that premeditating the crime and helping the person to know what to steal. While talking to me, he denied that it was the case and actually painted a very interesting story that he didn't even know the person, but somehow he was visiting Rigo's central market and talking in Georgian over the phone and somehow some person unknown to him came, approached him and talked to him in Georgian that he's also a Georgian citizen and he has no money and offered him to share a whole room together and Tsirikitsis told me that he agreed out of kindness and while they lived together while they shared a room together they talked also about rare books, but that he wasn't aware that this person had any intentions of doing anything illegal.

12:12So that was his story. And interestingly enough, the Latvian investigators didn't believe the story. It is quite rare for two Georgians to just meet randomly in a regal market and both of them are into rare books. So yeah, I guess. Yes. And basically he told the investigator that he knew that Latvian National Library, there are very expensive rare editions. And in case he indeed was involved in any stealing, he would have advised to steal more expensive editions. That's very interesting. So obviously he's not guilty because if he had been guilty, he would have advised to steal more expensive books and not less expensive.

12:57So strong defense. Yes, but it was not taken seriously, obviously. And he spent six months in the trial center in Latvia. And after the get, he told me that he was tried and he pleaded partially guilty as well. So was it the first time he was involved in illegal activities? No, actually, back in 2016, he was convicted in Georgia for stealing old books from the 263 Museum. After that, he managed to sell them quickly, after which he turned himself to the police. And because he admitted his guilt, he received a suspended sentence. Nina, who else was part of this operation? Cerkid's son, Mate, and his wife, Anna Gokuladze, also convicted for stealing books from Warsaw Library.

13:53So that's another country, Poland. And the Warsaw Library was hit the hardest. I think that in total 73 rare editions were taken from Warsaw. And these books were from early 19th century, and they survived a lot. Because they survived, for instance, in Warsaw Uprising in 1944. and they were saved. So these books seem a lot of history and they were stolen. So we know for sure that Mate, Cirekits and Anna Gogoladze did visit the library because they were on cameras, on closed-circuit cameras in there. But on these cameras, they didn't do anything illegal, just checked out some old editions. But later it was discovered that they tried to swap again and all the traditions with some first copies.

14:48Mate Tsrikitza pleaded not guilty, and his wife pleaded guilty in exchange for a suspended sentence. And also Tsrikitza's daughter was charged with help in the crime. Basically, Tsrikitza's daughter was charged with buying airplane tickets for Mate and Anna, so she was part of the crime. But she pleaded not guilty, and her lawyer told me that she wasn't aware why they were going to Poland, that she was not aware of any illegal activities planned. So that's four, three kids' relatives in total. And as you mentioned, this was like the biggest heist. Why was it so easy for them to steal these books from the Warsaw Library?

15:31Professor Ironim Gralov from Warsaw University told me that it could be connected with the eating of regime in the library. The ideal situation with rare books departments is when people read these books under supervision of librarians. But obviously, libraries try to be more open to visitors. So the rules changed and they were milder. And there is a suspicion that when the thieves came, they knew for sure which books they targeted. And they had very good mock-up copies. So they were well prepared. It could be that once they saw the ease of regime in the library, they saw it as a gold mine. And altogether, how many books were stolen?

16:20More than 170. And where did they end up finally? Where are these books? So there are signs that these books ended up in Russia at Moscow book auctions. So, for instance, there was another man who was sentenced for stealing in yet another country, yet another library. this time in Lithuania in Vilnius University Library. And he pled guilty and told that the crime was ordered by some Moscow auction house. He basically named a person, but it probably was not a real name because he didn't manage to find such a person with this name in Moscow auctions. But he told that he received the fake documents and fake copies of books.

17:08from Moscow. And after he stole 17 editions from Vilnius, he sent them to Moscow as well and got the fee in cryptocurrency. There is an evidence that books stolen from Warsaw University turned out at a specific Moscow auction house. And Professor Igeronim Grava sent me screenshots with the books from the library from the site of this auction. And it's a very interesting, actually, case which shows that it's very difficult to investigate the crimes in antique books because some pages were deleted from this auction website. But there are web archived versions. And it shows that there is a book with a 19th century stamp that is from Warsaw University Library.

17:56But the stamp isn't new, it's from 19th century. And I talked to the director of the auction and they say that by Russian law they are prohibited from selling books with modern stamps so they check very thoroughly. But it's absolutely fine to sell antique books with 19th century stamps because there were a great revolution in Russia in 1917. After that, so many things happened, so many historical events that you cannot just claim that 19th century stamp means anything. So that's the point. We have one side which claims it's surely from our library. And the other side claims that we are doing nothing wrong by Russian lore because there is no modern stamp here.

18:46But it's very interesting that they hadn't put a modern stamp on these valuable books and just kept the 19th century stamp. These books, they are historical objects, historical artifacts. They don't want to ruin the history by adding any modern inks or anything. These are seen as museum objects. They wanted to preserve the books in historical state. So there was no reason for the auction houses in Russia to be suspicious? Yes, no reason to be suspicious, because books with 1930 stamps are being sold in auctions around the world. So it's no big deal. And what about private collectors? What is their role in this whole thing?

19:34I think that the only people who buy these antique books now in Russia are private collectors only because they worth lots of money and state institutions, they don't have such money. I talked for my story with one of the rare collectors who actually is very open about his collection and published a catalog of his collection and also a book on antique books. And he told me that he himself seen these last two years from 2022 to 2024. And he told me that he noticed lots of new lifetime editions on Russian market. And it was clear for him that they've been stolen basically because it was like so many of this lifetime edition, it could not have been just a private collection going for sale.

20:28But why is that? He assumed that now when Russia is working with the best, that for some collectors, it's a good thing to take back the cultural values from the West. Some people may even close their eyes on the fact that the books might have been stolen because they see this as like taking their legacy out from the West back to Russia. This is the biggest European book heist, but it's not the first, is it? Obviously not. Like, it's interesting because both Beka Tsarekinse, who has been serving time for stealing books, and the expert who is a normal collector of antique books, they both told me it's very easy to steal from libraries.

21:13And Beka Tsarekinse, who was serving his time, told me that But if you want to steal a half kilo of gold, which costs 50 ,000 euros, you have to deal with 20 armed men. But if you want to steal a book, which costs the same 50 ,000 euros, you have to steal with a tiny old lady in the library with no CCTV. So that's why people go for it. Thank you, Nina, for sharing this fascinating story with us. It was great to have you. Always a pleasure. Thank you. Nina Nazarova from BBC Russian.

21:57You're listening to the documentary from the BBC World Series.

22:16fascinating chat about a different subject from world history. And in this new series, we're beginning with an epic voyage through the story of Homer, the Iliad and the Odyssey. And that's with Kyle Smith-Bino joining us. And then we'll be learning about Francis Galton and the racist, discredited pseudoscience of eugenics with Desiree Birch. We'll meet many medieval saints in their bone boxes with Rachel Parrott. So if that sounds like your sort of thing, listen to You're Dead to Me wherever you get your podcasts. Thank you. Bye.

22:50This is The Fifth Floor and I'm Farina Kamidi. Now have a listen to this. Let me quickly play something on KG and on KF shampoo. This is a seven-year-old boy who's become an online sensation in Nigeria. His name is Emmanuel and he plays the keyboard and the drums. BBC Pigeons reporter Adeshola Ikula Jolu went to meet him. My name now, Motirola Oluwa Emanuel. I started learning keyboard when I was four. Well, this young talent, he's an amazing boy. Interestingly, I've seen a couple of his videos online, and I'm wondering who is this young boy who is taking the Internet by surprise. I discovered he has this great passion for musical instruments, the drums and the keyboard, but essentially the drums.

23:55And here in Nigeria, you find the older generation who are very skillful in drumming. But then you find this young boy who is just so skillful on the drummer, you are wondering how. because ordinarily the stick for the drums should be heavier than his hands. But then he's holding this so firmly and so interestingly that people are wowed by his display of skills. Then I said, this is a good story that we can tell. So my dad taught me basic of keyboards. He even pasted a paper of inversions on the wall. So anytime he goes out, sometimes I would just look at the wall. I'll try and find what he said.

24:38He is from one of those families where the father and the mother, they love each other and they also love music. They used to sing in the choir, you know, join the churches where they have to sing, you know, and play some of the little instruments that are available. And at a very tender age, he started staying with his father and seeing how his father always watched tutorials on drums, on keyboard, and then his father could actually see that this young boy had so much interest in what he's watching. And then he decided to get him some set of drums as well as piano for him to also continue to practice so he could master this so well.

25:27So at a very tender age of two and three years, he was already very good. Since then, he has continued to master the skills so well. My first time that I played keyboard and I played it very well was at Pastor Inouye's church. When I was playing, at some point, I saw that everybody was just saying, wow, wow, wow, wow, wow. They were shouting, shouting, shouting. It was very loud and I felt proud of myself. He can play perfectly two instruments. the keyboard and the drums and currently he's also learning the guitar he's also learning the saxophone but at home and in school he's always exposed to this instrument and interestingly at home he has his own instrument in fact he has a mini studio at home where he also produce music and in school as well he has music teachers who are also developing him in terms of you know learning new skills i have good year training and it's called pitch perfect if somebody sings this is the doing of the lord i know that is on a miracle no the dad is also i know that is on f my favorite genre of music that i like to play and produce is he gospel hip hop and rock so um we spent about um five hours to six hours with him and interestingly i was actually interested in what he was going to become and i had him say he wants to be a footballer i said what you want to be a footballer with this talent you have already he said yes i'm not seeing any correlation between the two talents however but then he told me that he can actually match them you know do football by the side and also do music by the sides what our advice to them who want to learn how to play the instrument is that.

27:25That you keep learning, that you keep practicing because practice makes perfect. Bye. Adeshola Ikula Julu from BBC Pigeon. And if you want to let us know what you think about the show or you have questions for our amazing correspondents, send an email to the fifth floor at bbc.co.uk. That's the fifth floor, all one word, at bbc.co.uk. That's all from me, Ferenike Amidi, and the rest of the Fifth Floor team. Thanks for listening.

28:04You've been listening to the documentary from the BBC World Service.

28:13Hello, Greg Jenner here. I'm the host of You're Dead to Me, the BBC comedy show that takes history seriously. Every episode, I pair up a top historian with a fantastic comedian, and we have a lovely, funny, fascinating chat about a different subject from world history. And in this new series, we're beginning with an epic voyage through the story of Homer, the Iliad and the Odyssey. And that's with Kyle Smith-Bino joining us. And then we'll be learning about Francis Galton and the racist, discredited pseudoscience of eugenics with Desiree Birch. We'll meet many medieval saints in their bone boxes with Rachel Parrott.

28:46So if that sounds like your sort of thing, listen to You're Dead to Me wherever you get your podcasts. Thank you. Bye.