Russia on Sunday expelled 20 Czech diplomats in retaliation for a slew of diplomatic expulsions by Prague and gave the affected Czech diplomats just over 24 hours to leave the country, the RIA news agency quoted the foreign ministry as saying.
Prague had on Saturday ordered out 18 Russian diplomats, prompting Russia to vow on Sunday to “force the authors of this provocation to fully understand their responsibility for destroying the foundation of normal ties between our countries”.
The October 16, 2014, blast in Vrbetice, in the eastern Czech region of Zlin, set off 50 metric tons of stored ammunition, killing two people. Two months later, another blast of 13 tons of ammunition occurred at the same site.
Czech Prime Minister Andrej Babis said the attack had been aimed at a shipment to a Bulgarian arms trader.
“This was an attack on ammunition that had already been paid for and was being stored for a Bulgarian arms trader,” he said on Czech Television.
Bulgarian prosecutors charged three Russian men in 2020 with an attempt to kill arms trader Emilian Gebrev, who was identified by Czech media as the same individual. Reuters was unable to reach Gebrev for comment.
Czech police said two men using the names Alexander Petrov and Ruslan Boshirov had travelled to the Czech Republic days before the arms depot blast.
The tit-for-tat move comes as the European Union’s top diplomats prepare to meet on April 19 to discuss Russia’s alleged involvement in the explosion, an accusation Moscow has called “absurd” and a sign of Washington’s influence on Prague.
It also coincides with rising tensions in Ukraine over a massive Russian buildup of troops near its border, and with the United States hitting Moscow with major new sanctions and expelling 10 diplomats.
The row is the biggest between Prague and Moscow since the end of decades of Soviet domination of eastern Europe in 1989.
