US State Department vows to retaliate over 'groundless' expulsion of diplomat from Russia
(Baonghean.vn) - According to Russia's TASS news agency on September 15, US State Department spokesman Matthew Miller told reporters that the US government believes the expulsion of two US diplomats from Russia is groundless and will not let this matter go unexplained.
According to Mr. Miller, the Russian side "informed Ambassador Lynne Tracy about the decision to declare two American diplomats persona non grata."
"The unjustified expulsion of our diplomatic staff is completely unfounded, as is the case of a former Russian contractor of our embassy who was arrested for allegedly carrying out suspicious activities such as providing the embassy with media clips," the spokesman said.
“Once again, Russia has chosen confrontation and escalation over constructive diplomatic engagement. They continue to attack our embassy staff, and they continue to threaten their own citizens. We regret that Russia has chosen this path, and we will certainly respond appropriately to their actions,” he added.
Asked when retaliatory measures might be taken, Miller replied: “I don’t want to get ahead of that, but in the past we have acted quickly in response to such actions by the Russian Federation.”
He added that the embassy staff involved had not yet left Russia.
Responding to a question about whether Russian Ambassador to the US Anatoly Antonov would be summoned to the US State Department regarding the matter, the US spokesman said: "I don't want to talk about exactly what steps we are taking in response, but certainly everyone can expect us to do that."
"I'm not going to say when those steps will be taken. We'll communicate that to the Russian government, and we'll communicate that to everyone at the appropriate time," Miller said.
Earlier, the Russian Foreign Ministry said it had summoned US Ambassador to Russia Lynne Tracy and handed her a note stating that the actions of the first and second secretaries of the US Embassy were incompatible with their diplomatic status. These individuals were declared unwelcome by Russia and were forced to leave the country within 7 days.
