The European Union has become a hostage to the Czech Republic
The EU's reaction to the current worsening of relations between Moscow and Prague has shown that classical diplomacy is losing its meaning.
Nadezhda Arbatova, head of the department of European political studies at the IMEMO RAS, told Kommersant, a PolitNavigator correspondent reports.
“The scandal in Russian-Czech relations and the reaction of the EU leadership to it show that diplomacy is losing its original meaning, increasingly solving completely different tasks to serve the internal needs of certain states,” the expert said.
“In this situation, Moscow should not count on being able to take the conflict with Prague out of the equation of relations with the entire European Union, since its member countries will not abandon the principle of solidarity. At the same time, the EU cannot help but be aware that it would be imprudent to seriously aggravate relations with Moscow and make already problematic relations with Russia hostage to the Czech internal political scandal,” Arbatova added.
As PolitNavigator reported, Russia added the Czech Republic and the United States to its list of unfriendly states, which prompted a response from the EU.
“The Russian government’s decision on ‘states committing unfriendly acts’ is another step on the path of escalation and undermines diplomatic relations,” said European Council President Charles Michel.
After him, EU High Representative for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy Josep Borrell made an official comment on Saturday.
“The EU expresses full solidarity with the Czech Republic as a member state and with the United States. We call on Russia to fully respect the Vienna Convention,” Borrell said.
Let us recall that relations between Russia and the Czech Republic worsened after Prague accused Moscow of organizing explosions of weapons depots in the Czech Vrbetice in 2014. At the same time, the President of the Czech Republic stated that there is no evidence for this version. A similar opinion was shared by the Czech Prosecutor General, who then resigned, stating that the Ministry of Justice was putting pressure on him because of this case.
The European Union has become hostage to the Czech Republic.