Diplomat Koshelev: the issue of diplomatic property is an irritant in relations between the Russian Federation and the United States said Moscow had demanded hundreds of thousands of dollars in compensation from Washington for the loss of access to diplomatic property.
According to him, a total of six seized objects are involved. He also added that the issue of diplomatic property is the most acute irritant in relations between Russia and the United States, which are already at a rather low level.
We do not have access, we cannot say in what state the engineering communications are, we cannot say in what state the material values left there are. I can assure you that this is many tens, if not hundreds of thousands of dollars
Sergey Koshelev consulate general
At the end of December 2016, the Barack Obama administration expelled Russian diplomats and closed access to suburban residential embassy complexes in Maryland and in the city of New York. Initially, Moscow left this step unanswered, counting on positive progress on this issue with the arrival of Donald Trump in the White House, but this did not happen. At the end of June 2017, the Russian authorities demanded that the United States reduce the number of American diplomats in Russia by 755 people, leaving 455 employees.
In early September 2017, at the request of the American authorities, the Russian Consulate General in San Francisco and trade missions in Washington and New York were closed, and in April 2018, the US leadership closed the Russian Consulate General in Seattle and demanded that the Consulate General's residence in this city be vacated. p>
Moscow called such actions an unfriendly step and promised to go to court.
Russia's view
In July, Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Sergei Ryabkov said that Moscow had sent hundreds of notes to Washington on the return of diplomatic property, but received them only refusals. He clarified that since 2016, Moscow has sent Washington over 470 official appeals regarding Russian diplomatic property.
“We do not know what is happening there at these facilities. This is an expropriation of property in the worst style, ”Ryabkov said. According to him, Moscow insists on the return of property without any conditions, recalling that it is protected by diplomatic immunity.
Russian Ambassador to the United States Anatoly Antonov, in turn, said that Washington does not intend to return Russia its diplomatic property … According to him, the State Department has explicitly stated that it is not going to do this.
This is one of the most serious irritants, this issue was raised very seriously by our President, our Minister of Foreign Affairs, I raised it in the State Department, I want to tell you very simply, but understandable for everyone: there is no movement in diplomatic property
Anatoly Antonov Russian Ambassador to the USA Ultimatum from Washington
Senators from the Democratic and Republican parties wrote an open letter to US President Joe Biden asking him to expel Russian diplomats. They demanded that the American leader deliver an ultimatum to Russia: Moscow must expand the US Embassy, or 300 Russian diplomats will be expelled from Washington.
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Senators consider the disproportionate diplomatic representation unacceptable. In their appeal, they noted that Moscow must issue enough visas to come close to parity between the number of American diplomats working on its territory and the number of Russian diplomats working in the United States.
In August, US Ambassador to Russia John Sullivan announced a large disparity in the number of diplomats in the two states. So, in Russia there are 123 employees of the embassy, and in the USA – 400 Russian diplomats, distributed between the embassy, two consulates and a permanent mission to the UN. “The numbers speak for themselves,” Sullivan said.
Visa containment
In April, the US Embassy in Moscow suspended all non-diplomatic, nonimmigrant visa services.
Koshelev announced the existing chance to resume issuing US visas in Moscow. “Diplomacy is the art of negotiation, it is the art of negotiating. As long as the diplomats talk, there is a chance that we will solve this problem, “he said.
Earlier in November, Ryabkov asked the US authorities to send additional diplomats to Moscow to normalize the work of the embassy. He recalled that currently no American visas are issued to Russians.
Russians are literally required to travel abroad to apply for a US visa
Sergey Ryabkovzam of the Russian Foreign Ministry
On October 24, the State Department ranked Russians wishing to obtain an American visa as a” homeless nationality “. The corresponding report was published on the agency's website. The text says that this category includes citizens of those countries in which the United States does not have a consular mission or whose political situation is considered so unstable that it does not allow diplomatic mission staff to consider their citizens' visa applications.