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According to well-informed sources, only Austrian and Italian diplomats remain ambassadors of the member states of the European Union in Minsk.
Following the European Union’s decision to impose sanctions on 40 Belarusian authorities, Minsk called in its ambassadors from Vilnius and Warsaw for “consultations” and offered Lithuania and Poland to take a similar step and reduce the number of diplomats on their missions from 25 to 14 and from 50 to 18 respectively. that the number of diplomatic representatives corresponds to the number of representatives of Belarus in those countries).
Lithuania and Poland have stated that they do not plan to withdraw the ambassador and reduce the number of diplomatic personnel.
In response, Belarusian Foreign Ministry spokesman Anatoly Glaz warned that the proposal to remove ambassadors and reduce staff is mandatory.
Joseph Borrell, the European Union’s top foreign policy and security official, said the Belarusian authorities’ demand was “unfounded and unfortunate.”
According to a European Union diplomat, “this goes against the logic of constructive dialogue and will only increase the isolation of power in Minsk in the future.” “Attempts by the Belarusian authorities to attack individual members of the European Union will certainly not undermine the unity of the Union,” Borrell said.
Lithuania and Poland called their ambassadors for consultations this week. According to diplomatic sources, this decision was due to pressure from Minsk and the threat that the ambassadors would be declared undesirable. Lithuania and Poland do not agree to cut diplomatic staff.
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