The Vincent van Gogh painting Poppy Flowers, also known as Vase with Flowers, was stolen Saturday in Cairo. (Associated Press)

Egypt's deputy culture minister and four other people associated with a Cairo museum where a Vincent van Gogh painting was stolen have been arrested.

Egypt's top prosecutor ordered the detention of deputy culture minister Mohsen Shalaan on Monday but has not laid formal charges. Four security guards were also detained.

Shalaan will be held at least four days while police investigate whether neglect and professional delinquency were factors in the theft, according to state-owned Middle East News Agency.

Thieves stole the Van Gogh canvas Poppy Flowers, also known as Vase with Flowers, on Saturday after cutting it out of its frame at Cairo's Mahmud Khalil Museum.

But it emerged later that none of the museum's alarms and only seven of 43 surveillance cameras were working at the time of the robbery.

Prosecutor General Abdel-Meguid Mahmoud said Shalaan had been arrested because he has an office in the museum building and bears some responsibility for administering its affairs.

Shalaan may be charged with professional delinquency if he knew the alarms were malfunctioning and did not arrange to have them fixed, Mahmoud said.

The van Gogh painting, with an estimated value of $50 million US, was stolen in 1978 from the same museum, but authorities recovered it two years later at an undisclosed location in Kuwait.

The prosecutor said all Egyptian museums had been warned last year to upgrade their security after the theft of nine paintings from the Mohammed Ali Museum, also in Cairo.

Egypt has informed Interpol of the van Gogh theft and police at borders and airports are on alert, but the painting has yet to be found.

Egypt's antiquities chief, Zahi Hawass, has been ordered to co-ordinate with the security services to have alarm systems checked at museums throughout the country, newspapers said.

With files from The Associated Press