MOSCOW, September 7. /TASS/. The employment of Russian nationals at the US Embassy in Russia was related to the opportunity of obtaining a green card or a US citizenship, Russian Foreign Ministry Spokeswoman Maria Zakharova told the Russia-1 TV channel on Monday.

"So, it’s interesting how this turns out. On one hand, they hired them. On the other - and we said this but for some reason our German partners didn’t pay attention to this - as a rule, their employment and the opportunity of getting a contract, for instance, with the US Embassy, was directly linked with either receiving a green card or a citizenship. Such a small interesting detail," she said.

According to the spokeswoman, Russia and Western countries have different approaches to the make-up of the diplomatic staff and the staff of diplomatic agencies in general. In particular, Russia is sending its diplomats to work abroad while the Western countries hire local residents to work at their embassies. "In our country they were hiring Russian citizens. This is the essence," the diplomat pointed out.

As the spokeswoman explained, essentially there was a kind of "conversion of a Russian citizen into a citizen of their country." "Then they were receiving salary, then they were supporting the corresponding forces who were not shy to publish personal data. That’s it. Such a merry-go-round," the diplomat added.

Earlier, in her Telegram channel, the spokeswoman wrote that information that blogger Alexey Navalny was sponsored by the staff of foreign embassies in Russia had been confirmed. The majority of such contributions, according to her, were made through US and German diplomatic missions.