Bulgaria refused to allow the Russian Foreign Minister’s plane to take off with the department’s speaker Maria Zakharova on board.
Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov arrived in the capital of North Macedonia for the OSCE ministerial meeting via Greece, not Bulgaria. This was reported by the Russian TASS agency.
Lavrov has arrived in Skopje, his plane flies over Turkey and Greece, although at first it was expected that the plane of the Russian Foreign Ministry would fly to Bulgaria.
“As TASS learned, the Bulgarian side refused to allow the plane of the Russian Foreign Minister to take off if the official representative of the Russian diplomatic department, Maria Zakharova, was on board,” the agency wrote.
TASS allegedly had a corresponding note from official Sofia, stating that the permission for the Russian delegation to fly “does not apply to the Director of the Information and Press Department of the Russian Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Maria Zakharova, which will appear on the sanctions list.”
Lavrov is also under EU sanctions but not subject to travel bans to keep diplomatic channels open.
On the evening of November 30, Zakharova announced on Telegram that she was in Skopje.
We remind you that the foreign ministers of Ukraine and four EU states – Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania and Poland – boycotted the OSCE ministerial meeting in Skopje because of Lavrov’s presence here.
The head of diplomacy of the European Union, Josep Borrell, said that the entry of the Russian Foreign Minister to the OSCE summit was justified, because “it is important that he personally hears the criticism of the Russian Federation.”
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Source: korrespondent
I am David Wyatt, a professional writer and journalist for Buna Times. I specialize in the world section of news coverage, where I bring to light stories and issues that affect us globally. As a graduate of Journalism, I have always had the passion to spread knowledge through writing.