Russia has reduced its diplomatic and consular staff in Norway at the request of Norwegian authorities, its embassy in Oslo announced.
Russian diplomatic stations in Norway have reduced the number of diplomats and consular officers at the request of the Norwegian side, the Russian embassy said in an email to AFP.
Monday evening on her Facebook page, she announced that “the diplomatic contingent of the consular section of the embassy will be reduced to only two diplomats” by October 17.
The Russian consular sections in Kirkenes (northern Norway), near the Russian-Norwegian border, and in Barentsburg, a Russian mining community on the Norwegian archipelago of Svalbard in the Arctic, announced on X and Telegram that They were going to interrupt their services for the same reasons.
The Norwegian Ministry of Foreign Affairs confirmed that it had “conducted a dialogue for some time with the Russian side in order to guarantee the diplomatic presence in both countries”.
This is not an expulsion of diplomats from Norway, spokesperson Ragnhild Håland Simenstad told AFP.
Neither Russia nor Norway have specified the extent of the reduction of Russian diplomatic and consular staff in the Scandinavian country.
Following a diplomatic dialogue with the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, the embassy managed to maintain more diplomats than initially required, the diplomatic representation said in its email to AFP.
The Norwegian ministry declined to provide the reasons for its decision and the timing.
For several years, Norwegian intelligence services have considered Russia as the main threat in terms of espionage with China, but also in terms of sabotage.
In the wake of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, Norway expelled 15 employees of the Russian embassy in Oslo in April 2023, whom it suspected of espionage.
In retaliation, Russia expelled 10 Norwegian diplomats from Moscow.
Norway, which closed its consulate in Murmansk (northwest Russia), now has only a limited diplomatic presence in Russia with an embassy with greatly reduced staff in Moscow and a consulate in Saint Petersburg.
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