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US Ambassador Lynne Tracy at the memorial service for Kremlin critic Alexei Navalny

Photo: REUTERS

About a week before the presidential election in Russia, Moscow said it summoned US Ambassador Lynne Tracy - in protest against "attempts to interfere" by US non-governmental organizations (NGOs).

The Russian Foreign Ministry said it would suppress “subversive actions and the spread of disinformation in the context of the elections and the special military operation.”

The Kremlin describes Vladimir Putin's war of aggression against Ukraine as a "special military operation."

Moscow accuses three US organizations specializing in education of "implementing programs and projects with an anti-Russian orientation with the support of the embassy" and "recruiting agents of influence under the guise of cultural and educational exchange."

If US embassy representatives take part in such actions, they would face expulsion, the State Department said.

Ambassador Tracy had been told that Washington must stop funding the American Councils for International Education, Cultural Vistas and the Institute of International Education, which promoted "attitudes and values ​​foreign to Russian society."

All three organizations were declared “undesirable” in Russia and, according to Moscow, the ambassador was given a note of protest.

The Kremlin has been threatening for days with reactions to alleged Western interference in the election.

The protest note is apparently part of this propaganda narrative.

False information about the alleged summons of the German ambassador

The Russian Foreign Ministry claimed on Monday that it had summoned the German ambassador.

However, Alexander Graf Lambsdorff only appeared at a meeting at the Foreign Ministry in Moscow that had been planned for some time

Lambsdorff and the Foreign Office confirmed this.

The German ambassador to Russia was not asked to speak about the Taurus wiretapping affair.

“I can answer that with no,” said the spokesman for the Foreign Office.

Ambassadors from EU countries and the USA refused to meet with Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov before the sham election in Russia.

Vladimir Putin wants to be confirmed as president in the election on March 17th.

However, the Russians only have a theoretical choice.

In practice there are no real opposing candidates.

Opposition members are in exile or imprisoned.

czl/AFP