According to the findings of the News List, Prague Airport in Ruzyně registers three special flights to and from Russia at the end of May. That is, at a time when diplomats and other personal Russian foreign services have to leave the Czech capital.

In April, the Russians sent a special for deported diplomats, who the Czech authorities called spies.

Now, the finale of the Czech-Russian rift is approaching, when – in a historic step – equality is to be achieved in terms of staffing of the Czech and Russian embassies. The Russian one, even after 1989, retained its generous “Soviet” dimensions.

Several dozen Russians are to leave Prague now.

“We can confirm the information that Prague Airport has reported three special flights from and to Russia, one on May 29, and two on May 31. The reasons, circumstances and information about the passengers of these flights are not known to Prague Airport,” the spokeswoman told Seznam Prague Airport Klára Divíšková.

According to the List of Diplomacy News, these are flights for Russian diplomats. However, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs did not provide an official comment.

After it became clear that Russian intelligence agents of the GRÚ were involved in explosions in ammunition depots in Vrbětice, the Czech government began to act: it expelled 18 Russian diplomats serving in Prague. These were people who the Czech authorities were able to identify as agents of the Russian secret services GRÚ and SVR.

Moscow’s response was plus or minus symmetric. But even this first round did not erase the inequality in the staffing of the Czech embassy in Moscow and the Russian one in Prague. Even after the first “trimming” in Prague, the Russians had 27 diplomats and 67 other technical and administrative staff, while the Czechs had 5 diplomats and 19 other employees in Moscow.

As part of further negotiations between Moscow and Prague, the numbers at both offices were compared to 7 diplomats and 25 other employees.

Prague and Moscow are in contact, but according to sources, the List of Reports is not currently about possible changes or exceptions in the expected numbers of people at embassies.

According to sources from the Czernin Palace, debates are possible only after the numbers of people have been compared.

The Russians, meanwhile, have included the Czechia in a two-member list of countries they consider hostile – it is there along with the United States.

Secondly, when the Czechs are required to cap the numbers of Russians at the embassy in Prague, but in any case it was not an act of nominal deportation of specific people.

The Czechia is proceeding here in accordance with Article 11 of the Vienna Convention on Diplomatic Relations. According to the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, it stipulates that “in the absence of specific agreements on the number of staff of the (diplomatic) mission, the receiving State may require that the number of staff be maintained within reasonable and usual limits. in the receiving State and to the needs of the mission concerned “.

Now we are waiting for the departure of the Russians – and also for how smooth and clear their departure will be. According to information from the Czernin Palace, Russian diplomats need special documents to leave – thanks to which the Czech Ministry of Foreign Affairs should have an overview of the departure of specific people and their number.

The Czech side, on the other hand, solves the extra complication in that the Russians limit the number of local forces, ie Russians, that are allowed to employ Czech diplomacy in Russia. Nevertheless, the Czechs relied on local workers in significant measurements – unlike the Russians in the Czech Republic.