NATO and EU members Estonia and Latvia informed their Russian ambassadors to go away after Moscow mentioned it was downgrading diplomatic relations with Estonia, accusing it of “complete Russophobia.”
Estonia, Latvia and their Baltic neighbour Lithuania have been amongst a bunch of NATO allies arguing strongly for Germany to offer its Leopard battle tanks to spice up Ukraine in combating off Russia’s invasion.
The Russian International Ministry mentioned it had informed the Estonian envoy he should go away subsequent month, and each international locations can be represented in one another’s capitals by an interim chargé d’affaires as a substitute of an envoy.
Estonia responded in sort, telling the Russian envoy to go away by 7 February, International Affairs Minister Urmas Reinsalu mentioned.
“We’ll proceed to help Ukraine as Russia is planning large-scale assaults, and we name on different like-minded international locations to extend their help to Ukraine,” Reinsalu mentioned in a press release.
Latvia, in solidarity with Estonia, informed its Moscow envoy to go away by 27 February, in response to a tweet by International Minister Edgars Rinkevics. Each international locations mentioned they’re downgrading their diplomatic ties with Russia to chargé d’affaires degree.
Lithuania threw out its Russian envoy in April and downgraded diplomatic illustration, after Ukraine accused Russian forces of killing civilians within the city of Bucha.
Moscow mentioned Monday’s transfer was in response to an Estonian choice to scale back the scale of the Russian embassy in Tallinn.
“Lately, the Estonian management has purposefully destroyed your entire vary of relations with Russia. Whole Russophobia, the cultivation of hostility in the direction of our nation have been elevated by Tallinn to the rank of state coverage,” it mentioned.
Commenting on the downgrading of ties, Russian International Ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova mentioned: “The Estonian regime has acquired what it deserved.”
Estonia informed Russia on 11 January to scale back the variety of diplomats at its embassy in Tallinn to eight, equal to the variety of Estonian diplomats in Moscow.
All three Baltic international locations joined another Western allies final week in sending extra weapons of its personal to Ukraine.
