Czech Republic’s Prime Minister Babis and Foreign Minister Hamashek announced the expulsion of 18 Russian diplomats at a press conference on April 17.
The Czech Republic expelled 18 Russian diplomats for their alleged involvement in an explosion at a local arms depot.
Czech Republic Prime Minister Andrej Babis and Foreign Minister Jan Hamacek said Saturday (April 17) that the 18 Russian diplomats were expelled because they suspected the involvement of Russian intelligence agencies in an arms depot bombing in the Czech Republic in 2014.
Babis told a televised press conference that “there are many grounds for suspecting the involvement of personnel from the Russian intelligence agency’s military intelligence service (GRU) in the explosion of an arms depot in the Vrbetice region.”
Several explosions at the Vrbetice arms depot, 330 kilometers southeast of the Czech capital Prague, killed two employees of private companies on Oct. 16, 2014.
Foreign Minister Hamashek said 18 Russian embassy personnel identified as secret intelligence agents would be ordered to leave the country within 48 hours.
Interfax quoted Vladimir Dzhabarov, deputy chairman of the Russian Upper House Committee on International Affairs, as saying that the Czech side’s accusations were absurd and that Russia should respond in kind.
A Russian diplomatic source told Interfax that the Czech expulsion of Russian diplomats could lead to Russia closing the Czech Republic’s embassy in Moscow.
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