Czech Republic calls on EU allies to expel Russian diplomats as well

The Prime Minister of the Czech Republic, Andrej Babis, took advantage of the social summit in Porto to ask his partners in the European Union (EU) expel Russian diplomats in solidarity with the 2014 sabotage of a Czech ammunition depot assigned to secret agents in Moscow.

“I asked considering the expulsion of at least one diplomatBabis explained this Saturday at a press conference, in which he argued that EU countries they must consider that “if one member state is attacked, all are attacked”.

On April 17, the Czech executive expelled 18 Russian embassy employees accused of being agents of the Russian intelligence services, who Prague said were involved in two explosions in powder magazines in the east of the country that occurred in 2014.

Russia responded by expelling staff from the Czech embassy in Moscow.

Although NATO and the EU sympathize with Prague, only Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania and Slovakia have expelled Russian diplomats for this reason, although Poland, Bulgaria and Romania have done the same in recent months due to other conflicts with Moscow.

Babis expressed confidence that the European Union will vote on his request at the leaders’ summit on May 25.

Allied Bulgaria

The Bulgarian government announced on April 29 the expulsion of a Russian diplomat after the prosecution on Wednesday announced an investigation into the involvement of six Russian agents suspected in the explosion of four magazines in the past ten years. And he also demanded that Russian authorities cooperate in bringing to justice those responsible for the 2015 attempted murder of three Bulgarian citizens with similar poison in Novichok.

Bulgarian Acting Foreign Minister Ekaterina Zaharieva assured that Bulgaria reserves the right to take additional measures and insisted that Russian officials accredited to the Balkan country abandon all activities incompatible with diplomatic tasks.

He is the third Russian diplomat expelled from Bulgaria so far this year and the eighth since 2019, which has strained bilateral relations. Two other Russian diplomats were expelled in March for espionage and for capturing six Bulgarian soldiers who gave them confidential information and were arrested.

The Bulgarian prosecution has announced that it is investigating the possible involvement of Russian agents in the explosion of four weapons depots between 2011 and 2020, as well as links to similar events in 2014 in the Czech Republic.

The four magazines that exploded had weapons destined for Georgia and Ukraine, a country facing Moscow, and much of the material belonged to businessman Emilian Gebrev, who suffered an assassination attempt. in 2015 for which the Bulgarian justice blamed the Russian military intelligence (GRU).

With information from EFE

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