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Berlin has decided to close four Russian consulates operating in Germany, RIA Novosti reports. The German Foreign Ministry said that there are five consulates in the country so far. Now there will be only one left. The Russian embassy in Berlin will also continue its work.
The German consulates in Kaliningrad, Novosibirsk and Yekaterinburg will also close. Only diplomatic missions in St. Petersburg and Moscow will remain open.
Earlier, the Russian Foreign Ministry denied accusations from Berlin that Moscow, having set a quota for the number of German diplomatic corps in Russia, is to blame for the escalation of the confrontation. The escalation began last year with Berlin's decision to expel about 40 Russian diplomats and employees of diplomatic missions from the country, Russian Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova recalled.
In addition, she noted, at the beginning of this year, Germany undertook a ''quiet'' expulsion of about 30 more employees of Russian diplomatic missions in the country on far-fetched and unsubstantiated charges.
Listing Berlin's steps to destroy diplomatic relations with Russia, Maria Zakharova mentioned the introduction by the Germans in the spring of 2023 of a quota for certain categories of personnel of the Russian Embassy in Berlin and consulates general, which seriously complicated the activities of diplomatic missions.
The Russian Foreign Ministry called it natural that Moscow took retaliatory measures. Zakharova noted that the destruction of relations with Russia was Berlin's fault, which in a few months destroyed what had been created by generations of politicians, diplomats and residents of the two countries.
Russkiy Mir
