PRAGUE, May 31. /TASS/. The Czech Republic’s Foreign Ministry summoned Russian Ambassador to Prague Alexander Zmeyevsky over issues related to the use of Russian real estate in the country, the ministry said in a statement on its website.
"Based on doubts raised by the use of Russian real estate in the Czech Republic, Foreign Minister Jan Lipavsky decided to summon the Russian ambassador to the Czech Republic," the statement reads. "Deputy Foreign Minister Martin Dvorak summoned Alexander Zmeyevsky at 10:00 am on Tuesday in order to express the Czech Foreign Ministry’s doubts," the document adds.
Dvorak called on Russia to comply with bilateral agreements and Czech laws when using its real estate in the country. Lipavsky, in turn, said that "diplomatic missions in a foreign country should respect not only the Vienna Convention on Diplomatic Relations but also the rules and laws of the host country." According to him, "Russia is not doing any of this and does not respect the rule of law."
The Russian embassy has not commented on the situation yet.
Tensions between Russia and the Czech Republic escalated on April 17, 2021, after Prague had accused Moscow of involvement in an ammunition depot blast in the eastern Czech village of Vrbetice in 2014 and announced the expulsion of 18 employees of the Russian Embassy in Prague, who, according to the Czech authorities, were "officers of Russia’s SVR and GRU intelligence agencies." The Russian Foreign Ministry protested against the move that Prague had taken "under false pretenses" and declared 20 employees of the Czech Embassy in Moscow personae non grata. Disagreements also emerged on the use of real estate. In particular, Prague’s municipal authorities claimed that some Russian facilities in the Czech capital weren’t being used for declared diplomatic purposes.