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Czech minister’s statement proves Prague’s claims against Moscow are bogus, says diplomat

Earlier on Monday, Czech First Deputy Prime Minister Jan Hamacek said that Prague was not going to provide Russia with all the information on the investigation of the Vrbetice ammunition depot blast of 2014

MOSCOW, April 19. /TASS/. The comment made by Czech First Deputy Prime Minister and Interior Minister Jan Hamacek, who is also acting foreign minister, only confirms that Prague’s accusations against Moscow are false, Russian Foreign Ministry Spokeswoman Maria Zakharova told Channel One’s Vremya Pokazhet (or Time Will Tell) show on Monday.

"I saw a statement made by the head of the Czech Foreign Ministry, who said that Prague had no intention of disclosing all the details to Moscow on the investigation into the explosions in the warehouse. This proves that this whole story is a concocted, murky, disgusting fraud," she said.

"When it comes to a tragedy; people, officials, relevant agencies will use every opportunity to find out the truth. When at the very initial stage of publishing this information, they are already setting up barriers to obtaining all the information and they do it in such a way that echoes the traditional "highly likely" scenario," the diplomat added.

Earlier on Monday, Hamacek said that the Czech authorities were not going to provide Russia with all the information on the investigation of the Vrbetice ammunition depot blast of 2014. Prague claimed that Russian intelligence was involved in the incident.

On April 17, Prime Minister Andrej Babis and Czech First Deputy Prime Minister and Interior Minister Jan Hamacek who is also acting foreign minister announced the expulsion of 18 employees of the Russian Embassy in Prague, who were allegedly "officers of Russian intelligence services." The move came over the ‘newly-revealed’ allegations about the 2014 blast at the ammunition depot in the village of Vrbetice. In response, Russia declared 20 staff members of the Czech Embassy in Moscow personae non gratae.