MOSCOW, Oct. 18 (Xinhua) – The Russian Foreign Ministry announced Monday that Moscow has decided to suspend the operations of the Russian Permanent Mission to the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) in response to ” unfriendly actions “of the alliance.
The Russian ambassador to Belgium will be authorized to manage emergency contacts with NATO headquarters, while an ambassador of a NATO member state in Moscow will be able to do the same, the ministry said in a statement.
Russia is also suspending the activities of the NATO Military Liaison Mission in Moscow and its staff credentials will be revoked on November 1.
In addition, Russia is terminating the work of the NATO Information Office in Moscow.
The Russian side has informed the NATO International Secretariat of its decision.
NATO announced the expulsion of eight members of the Russian mission in Brussels on October 6, claiming they are “undeclared Russian intelligence officers”. In addition, the number of Russian staff at the mission was halved, from 20 to 10.
Before that, the strength of the Russian mission in Brussels had already been unilaterally reduced twice by NATO in 2015 and 2018, after the alliance’s decision on April 1, 2014 to suspend all practical civil and military cooperation between the two. parts. End
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