Polish ambassador to Russia summoned by foreign ministry
Poland's ambassador to Russia has been summoned by the Russian Ministry of Foreign Affairs in connection with an attack on the Russian ambassador.
On Monday, Russian ambassador to Poland Sergey Andreyev was surrounded by demonstrators as he tried to lay a wreath at a Soviet war memorial in Warsaw to mark the anniversary of the Soviet Army's defeat of Nazi Germany in World War II.
Protesters called him a "fascist" before two women got close enough to throw red paint at him. Andreyev was forced to abandon the ceremony and had to return to his car under police escort.
"In the matter of our relations with the Russian Federation, we know that Poland's ambassador in Moscow has been called to the Russian foreign ministry and I will not deny the facts here," Polish Foreign Minister Zbigniew Rau said on Wednesday.
He made the remark on the sidelines of the 33rd session of the Food and Agriculture Organisation of the United Nations' Regional Conference for Europe (ERC33), being held in the central Polish city of Lodz.
"In international relations the principle of reciprocity is always binding," Rau continued, adding that Polish authorities had tried to persuade the Russian embassy not to hold the event it planned on May 9.
"We also repeated that position in correspondence with Warsaw authorities in fear of an incident, which was a natural consequence of social sensitivities, both among Poles and refugees from Ukraine," Rau explained.
"However, what happened in no way changes our position in line with which diplomatic officials of other countries should be protected," Rau said. "Regardless of how much we feel the need to disagree with the policy of the government the diplomat represents."
