Russia summoned the French ambassador to Moscow Pierre Lévy on Friday after comments deemed “unacceptable” by the head of French diplomacy, Stéphane Séjourné, who estimated on Monday that Paris no longer saw the “interest” in discussing with Moscow. “It is not our interest today to discuss with Russian officials since the press releases that come out, the reports that are made are false,” Stéphane Séjourné declared a few days after a telephone conversation between the Russian and Russian ministers. French Defense which resulted in divergent accounts.
On Friday, the Russian Foreign Ministry summoned the French ambassador to Moscow in response. Pierre Lévy “has been informed of the unacceptable nature of such statements, which have nothing to do with reality”, commented Russian diplomacy in a press release. “We consider these statements by the French Minister of Foreign Affairs as a conscious and deliberate action by the French side aimed at undermining the very possibility of any dialogue between the two countries,” she continued.
Degraded relationships
After a conversation on April 3 between Defense Ministers Sébastien Lecornu and Sergueï Choïgou which aimed to transmit “useful information” to the Russians on the attack on Crocus City Hall near Moscow in March, French President Emmanuel Macron had denounced “baroque and threatening comments” from the Russians.
In its report of this interview, of which Paris had taken the initiative, Russia said it “hoped” that the French secret services had not been involved in this attack which left 144 dead on March 22. Speculations denied by France. Relations between Paris and Moscow have deteriorated since the start of the year, against a backdrop of conflict in Ukraine.
Russia notably claimed in January to have killed 60 French “mercenaries” in Kharkiv, in the north-east of Ukraine, while France denounced “a coordinated maneuver” of disinformation emanating from the Russians. Russian diplomacy also announced that it had summoned Slovenian Ambassador Darja Bavdaz Kuret on Friday to notify her of the expulsion of a Slovenian diplomat as a measure of “reciprocity” following a similar decision by Ljubljana in March against from a Russian representative.
On Thursday, the Russian Foreign Ministry announced that it had done the same with Austrian Ambassador Werner Almhofer after the expulsion of two Russian diplomats from Austria. Moscow said it had expelled an Austrian diplomat in response.