In December, the Russian ministry ordered the closure of Poland’s diplomatic post in St. Petersburg in retaliation for Poland ordering the closure of Russia’s consulate general in the western city of Poznań. On top of that, three Polish diplomats have been deemed personae non gratae and ordered to leave Russia.
Consul general Grzegorz Ślubowski published a heartfelt message on the consulate’s Facebook page, addressed to his colleagues and employees, “especially those who carried out their mission [...] already after the Russian attack against Ukraine.”
He also expressed gratitude to those, for whom the consulate was “a different world than the one surrounding [them] every day” and where they could “fulfill [their] dreams of a better world or forget, if only for a moment, about the [surrounding] reality.”
Ślubowski also thanked “all Polish diplomats who for years carried out their mission in these very hard circumstances” as well diplomats from other EU countries and the Polish diaspora remaining in St. Petersburg.
“This is not a goodbye forever, we’ll meet again,” the diplomat concluded his Facebook post.
Tit for tat
Polish foreign minister Radosław Sikorski announced
closure of one of Russia’s three consulates in Poland in late October. He said that his ministry has credible information that implicates Russia in acts and attempted
acts of sabotage in Poland and other EU countries.
In response, the Russian foreign ministry published a statement in early December, according to which “in accordance with the principle of reciprocity” Russia deemed three Polish diplomats working in the St. Petersburg consulate general personae non gratae and ordered the closure of the Polish diplomatic post by January 10.
The Russian ministry accused Warsaw of conducting “an openly hostile policy toward Russia [exemplified by] the closure of the Russian consulate in Poznań under false pretenses,” and vowed “harsh retaliation” for each “unfriendly” act by Poland.
Responding to the announcement, minister Sikorski said that Russia has no right to react in this manner, as the Polish decision to close down the Russian diplomatic post in Poznań was in reaction to Russian sabotage and acts of arson committed in Poland.
He said: “We [Poles] do not commit arson or conduct sabotage in Russia.
But everybody knows what Russia is like, so this action [closure of Polish consulate] is not unexpected,” he added.
