Criminal police of France together with Russian colleagues are searching for art dealer and French millionaire of Armenian descent Garik Basmadjyan who went missing in 1989 in Moscow.

Back in 1989 he brought a unique collection of paintings in Hermitage and Tretyakov Gallery that was estimated at $100 million. During business talks in Moscow he disappeared, and the collection is still in Hermitage.

The story sparked new interest when a native of USSR, former boxer Alexander Podlesniy was detained in France. Police believe he was directly involved in the disappearance of an art dealer.

Garik Basmadjyan was born in Jerusalem in 1947, and in the mid-1960s he moved to Yerevan. In 1977 Basmadzhyan and his wife moved to Paris.