London supports Prague in its response to Russia's "dangerous and malicious" activities

The Czech Republic expels 18 Russian diplomats ... and Moscow responds by expelling 20

Flags of the European Union and the Czech Republic fly in front of the Czech embassy in Moscow.

Reuters

Czech Prime Minister Andrej Babis said that his country had expelled 18 Russian embassy employees in Prague, due to bombings at a Czech ammunition depot in 2014. While Russia responded to the Czech government's “unprecedented” move by expelling 20 Czech diplomats, Britain said it “fully” supports the decision Czech Republic.

In detail, the Czech Interior Minister, Jan Hamachik, said yesterday in Prague that his government decided to expel 18 employees of the Russian embassy in the Czech Republic, after it was clearly proven that they work with the Russian intelligence services.

The minister added that these employees must leave the country within 48 hours.

The Czech Prime Minister Andrej Babis stressed that "the Czech Republic is a sovereign state, and it must respond to what the investigations have proven in an appropriate manner."

The explosions took place at an ammunition depot in Verbete, 110 kilometers east of the capital Prague, between October and December 2014.

A police unit specializing in organized crime revealed two pictures that match the photos of the two men wanted in connection with the poisoning of the double agent Sergey Skripal and his daughter Yulia in Britain in 2018.

There are rumors that the two suspected members of the Russian Main Intelligence Directorate stayed in the Czech Republic for six days in mid-October 2014, visiting the area where the ammunition depot was located.

There are allegations that they traveled using Russian passports bearing the names Alexander Petrov and Ruslan Bouchirov.

Moscow responded immediately, as the Russian Foreign Ministry announced, yesterday evening, the expulsion of 20 Czech diplomats, according to the "Russia Today" channel.

The ministry had earlier said in a statement, "We will take retaliatory measures that will compel the perpetrators of this provocative act to understand their full responsibility for destroying the normal relations between our two countries."

"This hostile step is part of a series of anti-Russian measures taken by the Czech Republic in recent years," the ministry added.

We can not but see an effect of the United States ».

For its part, Britain said that it "fully" supports the Czech Republic, which British Foreign Minister Dominic Raab said yesterday, that it revealed the extent to which Russian intelligence could reach after Prague accused Moscow of involvement in the explosion of the ammunition depot.

"The UK fully supports our Czech allies who have revealed how far the GRU will go in their attempts to carry out dangerous and malicious operations - and highlight the disturbing pattern of behavior after the attack in Salisbury," Raab said on Twitter.

In reference to the attack on Scribal.

On Thursday, the British Foreign Office summoned the Russian ambassador to London, Andrei Killin, due to "malicious activities" attributed to Moscow.

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