These expulsions are due to the fact that relations between Russia, the West and Russia have fallen into deep freeze after Moscow’s invasion in Ukraine.
The Netherlands claimed it was exiling 17 Russians it called intelligence officers disguised as diplomats. Belgium claimed it was expelling 21 Russians. One Russian diplomat was given 72 hours by the Czech Republic to leave the country. Four senior Russian diplomats were ordered by Ireland to leave the country due to activities that were not in accordance with international diplomatic standards.
North Macedonia said late Monday that it was exiling five Russian diplomats who were involved in “activities against the Vienna Convention on Diplomatic Relations”.
The Czech Foreign Ministry stated that “Together, with our allies we are decreasing the Russian intelligence presence within the EU.”
Last week, Poland expelled 45 Russians who the government identified as intelligence officers and using their diplomatic status to operate in the country.
The Netherlands claimed that it made its decision after consulting with “a number other like-minded countries”, citing similar expulsions from the United States, Poland and Slovakia, Estonia, Latvia.
The Dutch ministry released a statement saying that the cabinet had made the decision to act due to the threat to national security posed to by the group. The intelligence threat to the Netherlands is still high. These intelligence officers are undesirable because of Russia’s current attitude. The deportation of intelligence officers is an act taken to protect national security.
Wopke Hoekstra, the Dutch Foreign Minister, stated that he was ready for a retaliation by Moscow.
He stated that “Experience has shown that Russia doesn’t leave these types of measures unanswered.” “We can’t speculate on that, but we know that the Ministry of Foreign Affairs has plans for different scenarios in the near future.”
This was evident earlier Tuesday when Russia expelled 10 diplomats from the Baltic EU states Estonia, Latvia, and Lithuania as a retaliation to those countries having expedited Russian diplomats earlier in the month.
According to the Russian Foreign Ministry, the cancellation of the accreditation of four Lithuanian diplomats, three Latvians, and three Estonians was being considered. They would then be required to leave Russia. This corresponds to how many Russian diplomats each country has previously expelled.
In solidarity with Ukraine, the Baltic countries expelled 10 Russian diplomat staff members.
Moscow claimed that the move was “provocative” and completely baseless and summoned the Estonian and Latvian ambassadors to Moscow for an official protest.