Some of the employees of the German embassy in Russia, who were declared persona non grata after Berlin expelled Russians who were engaged in activities incompatible with diplomatic status, returned to their homeland on Monday.
This is stated in the statement of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Germany, quoted by the AFP agency.
The German Foreign Ministry did not specify in the message the number of German diplomats who returned to Berlin, and emphasized that they "have always behaved in accordance with their diplomatic status."
According to the representative of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Russia, Maria Sakharova, "more than 20 German diplomats" are being expelled from Moscow. Russia announced the expulsion of German diplomats a week ago due to the "massive" expulsion of employees of the Russian embassy from Germany.
"In order to reduce the presence of Russian special services in Germany, the federal government has been in contact with the Russian side for the past few weeks. As a result, in mid-April, employees of the Russian representative offices in Germany left the country," the German Foreign Ministry emphasized on Monday.
They added that the activities of the expelled Russians "did not correspond to their diplomatic status."
