Cancellation of Lavrov's visit – Attempt to fall from the government | POLICY

With the desire to bring down the tension in the Greco-Russian relations, but noting that it will not leave challenges and unanswered challenges, Athens appeared yesterday after the post-meeting. noon at the Maximos mansion, Prime Minister Alexis Tsipras with Foreign Minister Nikos Kotzias. "We do not intend to follow up," he added, after the prime minister's office. Tsipras' badociates said Greece would continue to respond resolutely whenever a question of national sovereignty is raised, but adding that the government is following and will continue to pursue its established policy of promoting relations with Russia in bilateral and bilateral relations. multilateral level. Of course, after a sudden escalation in the afternoon of Wednesday, no one can rule out new tensions, especially since the Moscow reaction has not yet been officially announced, which echoes the decision of Athens to expel the two Russian diplomats and a ban on entering the country in two others

The messages of the Russian side, however, do not claim to accelerate the situation. Yesterday, the Russian news agency TASS was broadcast by the cancellation of the planned visit of Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov to Bulgaria in the autumn. The Russian ambbadador to Athens, Andrei Maslov, made statements to the agency. "I think the current situation is losing its relevance, at least in the timeframe we were talking about, that is to say in September," Maslov said. Regarding the countermeasures announced by the Russian Foreign Ministry, the Russian ambbadador did not go into detail: "We have already announced that there would be retaliation, I do not know not when, in whom and in what dimensions, but of course according to the existing practice "

Athens, however, took care of references to the repeal of Lavrov's visit, which, in terms of tensions in the Greco-Russian relations, was more than expected.The Foreign Ministry said that the Russian side had made the request for visit, adding that, anyway, the Russian Foreign Minister is welcome in Athens.

Maintaining tension, however, is also an impediment to Tsipras' visit to Moscow Prime Minister Vladimir Putin had called the prime minister last March when Russian President Vladimir Putin called on him. to congratulate him on his reelection.

Yesterday, the representative of the Russian Foreign Minister, Maria Zacharova, via Twitter, a really organized campaign "to expel diplomats and called on the Greek people" to communicate with the Russian people and not to suffer provocations dirty. "

Yesterday, the mayor of Alexandroupolis Evangelos Lambakis and his metropolitan It is recalled that Alexandroupolis was at the center of the reports on the action of the Russian agent in Greece, which provoked the decision to expel the Russian diplomats

Negative poll in Macedonia

In a new Council of political leaders FYROM, Sunday or Monday, an agreement will be sought on the procedures for conducting the referendum on the agreement of Prespa and yesterday did not produce a result after a four-hour meeting.After unsuccessful meeting yesterday, Macedonian Prime Minister Zoran Zaev expressed hope that the new meeting will lead to an agreement on the constitution of the referendum committee and stressed that the purpose of the referendum is to succeed the next steps of the ratification process of the Skopje-Athens agreement totally depend on a positive outcome the referendum

At the same time, the first major survey in the FYROM on the acceptance of the Prespa agreement shows that 45.9% is in favor of the agreement. Of course, the result is very different with respect to national citizenship. The Slavo-Macedonians are against the agreement against 74.5% and only 25.5% see it positively. On the other hand, the Albanians of the FYROM consider that the agreement of Prespa is good at the overwhelming rate of 94.7%