GERMAN POLICE HAVE released CCTV footage showing a suspect in the Dresden jewellery heist smashing a display case with an axe.

Saxony Police (Polizei Saschen) published the video of the robbery on their website and appealed for help from the public with information to find the thieves. 

In the early hours of Monday morning, two robbers broke into the Dresden Green Vault museum and stole a number of treasures estimated to be worth around several hundreds of millions of euros. 

In the black-and-white clip of the crime, one of the two robbers can be seen using an axe to smash a display case. 

The thieves set off a fire in an electrical panel near the museum in the early hours of Monday, deactivating the alarm and street lighting. They then broke in, stole the jewels and fled the scene in an Audi A6. 

Police said in a statement the “whole act lasted only a few minutes”.  

Some of the stole items from the heist. Source: Polizei Saschen

Yesterday evening, police chief Joerg Kubiessa told broadcaster ZDF that a “criminal gang” may be behind the robbery.

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Dresden police said they were also in contact with colleagues in Berlin to explore possible connections to a similar heist in the capital two years ago.

The items were taken from a collection of 18th-century Saxony ruler Augustus the Strong. Experts say they may never be recovered.

The prized artefacts include a sword whose hilt contains nine large and 770 smaller diamonds, and a bow made of diamonds. 

With reporting by - © AFP 2019