MOSCOW, April 5. /TASS/. Many of museum exhibits were taken from Iraq and Syria under someone's order or got into the "black market," Russian Permanent Delegate to UNESCO Eleonora Mitrofanova said on Tuesday during a Moscow-Paris video conference.

"As many as 14 thousand exhibits have disappeared from Iraqi museums that were looted during the military campaign," she said, adding that "11,000 items are illegally kept in the United States. When I ask the US representative about what will happen to these exhibits, he keeps silent."

Many museum pieces, according to Russia's permanent representative to UNESCO, "were taken from there on somebody’s orders." "This matter should be handled by intelligence services," she said. "UNESCO will not raise the issue of criminal prosecution, since this problem affects each country individually."