The state news agency, citing Culture Minister Farouk Hosni, said the painting by the Dutch post-Impressionist master had been found and the thieves detained. The short report gave no more details.

An airport security source said an Italian youth was being held at Cairo airport with the stolen painting. The youth said he had bought the painting from an Egyptian and was not aware it had been stolen, the source said.

The painting had been taken earlier in the day from Cairo's Mahmoud Khalil Museum on the banks of the River Nile.

In an Arabic statement issued earlier, the Culture Ministry identified the painting as "The Poppy Flower.” The museum is home to one of the Middle East's finest collections of 19th and 20th century art put together by the politician Mohammed Mahmoud Khalil, who died in 1953.

Among works at the museum are pieces by Gauguin, Monet, Manet and Renoir.

The culture minister had earlier instructed security forces to take all necessary measures to ensure the painting did not leave the country.

It was not immediately clear how the painting was stolen.