All news

Russia not to delay going to court over situation with diplomatic property in US

Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Sergei Ryabkov said he had warned the US side about Moscow’s plans to go to court over the situation with Russian diplomatic property in that country

MOSCOW, September 12. /TASS/. Russia is not going to delay going to court over the situation with Russian diplomatic property in the United States but will do it promptly, Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Sergei Ryabkov told TASS over the phone on Monday after his consultations with US Under Secretary of State Thomas Shannon in Helsinki.

"We will do it swiftly, we will not drag on it," he said, adding that "so far, there are no concrete time frames."

He said he had warned the US side about Moscow’s plans to go to court over the situation with Russian diplomatic property in that country. "We warned that that we will go to court, they know about that," Ryabkov told TASS.

Russia "has no other way than to sue the US government," he stressed.

On September 2, the United States’ authorities closed Russia’s consulate general in San Francisco, the trade mission in Washington and its office in New York. The former two facilities are Russia’s government property. Moscow considers the seizure of Russian diplomatic property as an openly hostile act and calls on the United States to immediately return these facilities.

Addressing a news conference after the BRICS summit in China’s Xiamen on September 5, Russian President Vladimir Putin announced plans to go to court over the seizure of Russia’s diplomatic property in the United States. "The American side has stripped Russia of the right to use its property - this is obvious violation of proprietary rights of the Russian side. To begin with I will issue instructions to the Foreign Ministry to take the case to court. Let us see how effectively the vaunted US judicial system works," Putin said.

The situation around Russian diplomatic property in the United States was in focus of Ryabkov’s meeting with Shannon on Monday.