PRAGUE – The Czech Republic said on Sunday it had briefed NATO and European Union allies on alleged Russian involvement in an ammunition depot explosion in 2014, and the matter would be discussed at a meeting of foreign ministers on Monday. matters in the EU.
The Central European country on Saturday ousted 18 Russian embassy staff on the issue, saying investigations linked Russian intelligence to the blast, which killed two people.
Russia’s Interfax news agency quoted Vladimir Dzhabarov, first deputy head of Russia’s upper house committee on international affairs, on Saturday as saying that Prague’s allegations were absurd and that Russia’s response should be proportionate.
Meanwhile, another high-ranking official, Leonid Slutsky, chairman of the State Duma’s Committee on International Affairs, said on Saturday that the grounds for the Czech move “do not stand up to criticism”, adding that the Czech Republic “has the Russophobic course of the United States follows “States” by expelling Russian diplomats, reports the Russian state news agency Tass.
The evictions and allegations come at a time of heightened Russian-Western tensions and have caused the biggest dispute between the Czechs and Russia since the end of 1989 of the Communist government, when Prague was under Moscow for decades.
The EU executive commissioned on Sunday remarks by acting Czech Foreign Minister Jan Hamacek on Twitter that the dispute would be addressed at a previously scheduled video conference of EU foreign ministers on Monday.
Separately, Czech police said they were looking for two men in connection with serious criminal activities bearing Russian passports in the names of Alexander Petrov and Ruslan Boshirov, and that the men were in the country in the days before the 2014 explosion. .
These were the aliases used by two Russian military intelligence (GRU) officers who accused British prosecutors of attempting to poison former Russian spy Sergei Skripal and his daughter Yulia with the nerve agent Novichok in the English city of Salisbury in 2018. .
Moscow has denied involvement in the incident.
The United States and Britain have said they are in full dispute with the Czech Republic over the dispute with Russia.
A statement by the US embassy in Prague, said on Saturday that Washington “stands with its steadfast ally, the Czech Republic. We appreciate their important action to impose Russia on its dangerous actions on Czech soil.”
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Meanwhile, British Foreign Secretary Dominic Raab said on Twitter: “The UK fully supports our Czech allies, who have exposed the length of the GRU’s efforts to carry out dangerous and malicious operations – and stressed a disturbing pattern of behavior following the attack in Salisbury. “
The Kremlin’s relations with many NATO members, most of whom are in the EU, as well as the United States, have been more tense than at any time since the Cold War.
The West has sounded the alarm over a large Russian military build-up on Russia’s western borders and in Crimea, which annexed Moscow from Ukraine in 2014, following an increase in fighting in eastern Ukraine between Russian – backed separatists and governmental powers.
The United States this week imposed sanctions on Russia for interfering in last year’s US election, cyber-hacking, Ukraine and other alleged malicious actions, which Moscow is addressing.
Last month, US President Joe Biden said he believed his Russian counterpart Vladimir Putin was a “killer” and Moscow recalled its ambassador to Washington for consultations.