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Saturday, 24 April 2021_Russian President Vladimir Putin has signed a decree on countermeasures against countries that take “unfriendly” actions towards Russia as a diplomatic row escalates between Moscow and some European states.
Putin signed the law on Friday to limit the number of local staff working at foreign diplomatic missions and other agencies, and tasked the government with providing a list of “unfriendly” foreign states that would be subject to the restrictions.
The law, published on the Kremlin website, authorizes Moscow to restrict or even ban employment contracts with “state bodies and state institutions of foreign states committing unfriendly acts against the Russian Federation.”
"Labor contracts with individuals in excess of the number set by the government that were signed before the commencement day of this decree are to be terminated," the document said, adding that the restrictions "are not applicable to nationals of unfriendly states arriving from such states as employees of diplomatic missions, consular institutions and offices of government institutions of corresponding unfriendly foreign states."
The decree, as the website said, comes into force from the day of its official publication and will be valid until these countermeasures are cancelled.
The bill comes amid growing diplomatic tensions between Russia and Western-aligned governments in central and eastern Europe.
The Russian Foreign Ministry said in a statement on Friday that it had informed Polish Ambassador to Moscow Krzysztof Krajewski that five employees of the embassy of Poland had been declared persona non grata and would have until May 15 to leave the country.
The ministry added that the measure came in response to Poland’s April 15 decision to expel three Russian diplomats over the allegation that they had been involved in "activities to the detriment" of the NATO member state.
On Tuesday, Russia expelled two Bulgarian diplomats in retaliation for Sofia’s recent expulsion of two Russian diplomats over alleged espionage activities.
Over a similar allegation, the Czech Republic had earlier asked 18 Russian diplomats to leave. Moscow responded with the expulsion of 20 Czech diplomats.
Russia has denied the allegations against its diplomats.
‘US foreign policy unstable, Washington’s credibility declined’
In an op-ed published by the state-run RIA Novosti news agency on Friday, former Russian president Dmitry Medvedev censured US foreign policy as "unstable" and said the situation was "largely caused by domestic reasons but also by a certain decline in the credibility of the US as the leader of the Western world."
Medvedev also warned that relations between Moscow and Washington had grown confrontational and plummeted to Cold War-era levels.
“In recent years, relations between Russia and the United States have actually shifted from rivalry to confrontation, essentially returning to the Cold War era,” Medvedev wrote in the article for RIA Novosti.
“Sanctions pressure, threats, confrontation, defense of one's selfish interests – all of this is plunging the world into a state of permanent instability,” he added.
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