Czechs expel 18 Russians over huge depot explosion in 2014
PRAGUE -- The Czech Republic announced Saturday that it was expelling 18 Russian diplomats who it has identified as spies in a case related to a huge ammunition depot explosion in 2014.
Prime Minister Andrej Babis said the move is based on “unequivocal evidence" provided by the Czech intelligence and security services that points to the involvement of Russian military agents in the massive explosion in an eastern town that killed “two innocent fathers."
“The Czech Republic is a sovereign state and must adequately react to those unprecedented findings," Babis said.
Interior Minister Jan Hamacek, who is also serving as the country's foreign minister, said the 18 Russian embassy staffers were clearly identified as spies from the Russian intelligence services known as GRU and SVR and were ordered to leave the country within 48 hours.
Read more: https://www.sunherald.com/news/nation-world/article250753639.html
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Source: BBC
By Gordon Corera
Security correspondent
17 April 2021
Two Russian men suspected of carrying out the Salisbury poisoning of Sergei Skripal in 2018 are being linked to an explosion at an arms depot in the Czech Republic four years earlier.
Czech police issued photos of Alexander Petrov and Ruslan Boshirov, who they say were in the country at the time of the blast, which killed two people.
The Czech Republic has expelled 18 Russian diplomats in retaliation.
A senior Russian parliamentarian on Saturday called the claim absurd.
Czech Prime Minister Andrej Babis said the country had to react to revelations tying the blast to Russia's military intelligence service, the GRU.
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Read more: https://www.bbc.com/news/uk-56790053
"Alexander Petrov" (left) and "Ruslan Boshirov" (Metropolitan Police)
