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Valuable statues and additional items have been stolen from the National Museum of Syria in the capital, sources confirm.

The robbery was discovered on the start of the week, when employees reportedly found that one of the museum's doors had been forced from the inside.

The six stolen statues were marble creations and traced back to the Roman period, one official told the news agency.

Cultural heritage officials said it had launched a probe to determine the "details surrounding the theft of a collection of exhibits", and that actions had been implemented to strengthen security and monitoring systems.

The chief of internal security in Damascus province, Security Chief Atkeh, was referenced by the state-run Sana news agency as saying that law enforcement were probing the theft, which he said had targeted several "archaeological statues and rare collectibles".

He noted that museum protectors at the facility and other persons were being interrogated.

The cultural institution, which was founded in the early twentieth century, contains the significant archaeological collection in Syria.

It includes clay cuneiform tablets dating back to the 14th Century BC from historical site, where proof of the most ancient linguistic system was discovered; 1st and 2nd Century AD Greco-Roman sculptures from the ancient city, among the foremost historical locations of the ancient world; and a third century synagogue that was established at an ancient location.

The facility was forced to close in the early 2010s, a year after the outbreak of the internal strife. Most of the collection was removed and kept at undisclosed sites to safeguard them.

It began limited operations in recent years and returned to normal in January 2025, one month after insurgents overthrew President Bashar al-Assad.

All six of Syria's Unesco World Heritage sites were harmed or partly ruined during the conflict.

The militant faction demolished several religious structures and additional edifices at the archaeological site, stating that they were against their beliefs. Unesco censured the damage as a atrocity.

Numerous historical objects were also damaged or looted from dig sites and cultural institutions.