MOSCOW, June 26. /TASS/. An attempt to take cultural treasures from the Kiev Pechersk Lavra elsewhere would be a monstrous act; all relevant information should be checked immediately and believers of the Ukrainian Orthodox Church given the opportunity to make sure that the relics are safe, Vladimir Legoida, the head of the Synodal Department of the Moscow Patriarchate for Relations with Society and the Media, said on Monday.

Earlier in the day, the press office of Russia's Foreign Intelligence Service (SVR) released a statement by SVR Director Sergey Naryshkin saying that the Kiev authorities had agreed with UNESCO to move Christian valuables of the Kiev Pechersk Lavra, including relics kept there, to museums in Europe.

"The information about the plans for moving cultural valuables from the Kiev Pechersk Lavra is scandalous and requires immediate verification. One cannot but recall the actual looting of museum valuables from Baghdad museums in 2003 after the Western coalition’s army entered that country. The Lavra’s valuables are an asset of the Ukrainian people and world Orthodoxy as a whole. An attempt to take them anywhere would be a monstrous act," Legoida wrote on his Telegram channel.