German police check new art haul near Stuttgart

These are among the Munich trove: Otto Griebel's Child at a Table and Otto Dix's Lady in a Loge

Police and art experts are checking 22 artworks found in southwest Germany which may be linked to the huge hoard of art treasures seized in Munich.

The regional broadcaster SWR says most of the 22 works are valuable paintings. Some may have been looted by the Nazis.

On Saturday Paris Match magazine published a photo of a man alleged to be Cornelius Gurlitt, the Munich collector. He was spotted in Munich.

So far 25 of the Munich works have been listed on the website www.lostart.de.

Gurlitt connection

On Saturday police in Baden-Wuerttemberg removed 22 artworks from a flat in Kornwestheim, a town near Stuttgart. They are now being examined at a secret location.

The flat belongs to an 80-year-old man, who is a brother-in-law of Cornelius Gurlitt and, like him, a former art collector.

Four of the paintings are believed to have been acquired from Mr Gurlitt, SWR says.

Stuttgart police said the 80-year-old was not suspected of any crime and had himself contacted the police to get his collection stored in a safe place. The intense media interest in the Gurlitt case had made him anxious, SWR reported.

More than 1,400 artworks were found at the Munich flat of Mr Gurlitt in March 2012.

The total value has been estimated at about 1bn euros (£846m; $1.35bn).

German authorities showed images of some of the works, by famous artists such as Marc Chagall, Otto Dix, Max Liebermann and Henri Matisse. But they have not yet published a full list and the officials stressed that a painstaking investigation is now under way.

Some of the Munich works may have been stolen from Jews and kept in Nazi collections during 1933-1945.