The political scandal between Moscow and Prague

This is a special program from the ’ANNA NEWS’. I am Constantine Reztsov.

Moscow and Prague will leave 32 employees each in their embassies, the Minister of Foreign Affairs of the Czech Republic, Jakub Kulganek, told to the newspaper ’Blesk’.

He specified the following: «7 diplomats and 25 administrative and technical staff in each embassy». The number of the employees of the Russian and Czech consulates won’t change.

The changes were made due to the recently erupted diplomatic scandal between Moscow and Prague. Last week, the Czech authorities accused Russia of involvement in the terrorist attack — an explosion — at the Vrbetica arsenal, in 2014. As a response, Prague expelled 18 embassy staff.

In response, Moscow declared 20 employees of the Czech embassy to be ’persona non grata’. Prague called such response «too fast and too strong.» The work of the Czech embassy in Moscow was paralyzed.

The Kremlin regarded the accusations from the Czech Republic about the involvement in the terrorist attack as ’outrageous’ and ’baseless’. The official representative of the Russian Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Maria Zakharova, called the current situation «a marasmic parade». Moscow promised that Prague will pay a «colossal price» for this hostile action.

Prague has officially announced the reduction in the number of diplomatic missions in both countries. The deadline was set at the end of May. About 70 people can be expelled as the result.

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