Czech Republic Believes Russia Will Act as a State of Law After Cancelling Land and Real Estate Rights for Diplomatic Purposes

The Czech Republic believes that Russia will act as a state of law. This was announced on May 18 in the Czech Foreign Ministry, commenting on Moscow’s possible response to the abolition by Prague of Russia’s right to use land and real estate in the republic free of charge for diplomatic purposes.

According to the Minister of Foreign Affairs of the Republic Jan Lipavsky, The Czech Republic does not own real estate in Russia on an exclusive basis, and only the embassy and the Czech House in Moscow have a special status. At the same time, the Czech Foreign Ministry admits the possibility that its decision to cancel the right of the Russian Federation to freely use a number of land plots and real estate in the Czech Republic for diplomatic purposes will lead to retaliatory actions aimed at the Czech House in Moscow, which was erected on a land plot owned by Russia.

“The building of the diplomatic department serves the purposes of the mission and is under diplomatic protection. The Czech house is regulated by an international treaty and, again, exists in a different regime. We do not have a facility there that would be wholly owned by the Czech Republic, without other forms of work regulation,” – said the head of the Czech Foreign Ministry.

At the same time, Lipavsky clarified that the Czech Foreign Ministry will not yet publish an exact list of objects that are affected by the adopted resolution.

“We clearly informed the Russian side that these buildings do not belong to the diplomatic mission. However, we will take care of our property as an acting owner.” he said.

Recall that on May 17, the Czech government canceled nine decrees adopted from 1970 to 1982, on the basis of which the Soviet Union, and then the Russian Federation, received the right to use a number of land plots and real estate in the Czech Republic for diplomatic purposes free of charge. Now Prague can put forward millions of euros in financial claims against Moscow. On May 18, the Russian diplomatic department threatened the Czech Republic with retaliatory steps. According to the official representative of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of the Russian Federation Maria Zakharova, “The demand by the Czech authorities for rent, and even retroactively, resembles extortion at the state level and violates the provisions of the Vienna Convention on Diplomatic Relations of 1961.” She also stressed that Moscow would “take protective measures, including with the use of legal mechanisms.”