Russia to close Polish consulate in Siberia in row over railway sabotage

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MOSCOW/WARSAW (Reuters) -Russia on Thursday ordered Poland to close its consulate in the Siberian city of Irkutsk in retaliation for Warsaw’s decision to close the last Russian consulate in Poland after a railway explosion that was blamed on Moscow.

Poland, a former Warsaw Pact member which joined the U.S.-led NATO military alliance in 1999, said two Ukrainians working for Moscow were behind a blast earlier this month on the line that links Warsaw to the Ukrainian border.

Polish Prime Minister Donald Tusk said the blast was an “unprecedented act of sabotage” and Poland’s special services said evidence pointed to Russian intelligence being behind it.

Moscow denied that, saying levels of “Russophobia” were so high in Europe that it was routinely blamed for any incident without any evidence being presented.

Russia’s Foreign Ministry summoned Polish Ambassador Krzysztof Krajewski and handed him a note explaining that the Irkutsk consulate would be closed from December 30 in response to Warsaw’s decision to close the Gdansk consulate.

“The curtailment of the Russian consular presence in Poland under an absurd pretext is an openly hostile, unjustified step by the Polish leadership,” the Foreign Ministry said.

Moscow said it wanted to issue a reminder that any attacks on Russia would elicit “an adequate, painful response.”

Poland said it saw no basis for closing its consulate in Irkutsk.

“We accepted Russia’s decision to withdraw consent, although we believe there were no grounds for it because it is not Poland that is organising acts of terror in Russia,” Maciej Wewior, a spokesman for the Foreign Ministry, told reporters.

He said there were three employees at the consulate and they would leave Russia by the end of next month.

(Reporting by Guy Faulconbridge in Moscow, Maxim Rodionov in London and Anna Wlodarczak-Semczuk and Pawel Florkiewicz in Warsaw; editing by Mark Trevelyan)