Russian Foreign Ministry building
The Russian Ministry of Foreign Affairs has declared persona non grata one of the employees of the Bulgarian Embassy in Moscow. This was reported on the website of the Russian Foreign Ministry.
The Foreign Ministry announced that it was expelling the assistant to the Bulgarian military attaché, Lieutenant Colonel Mitko Borisov. “The specified employee was ordered to leave the territory of the Russian Federation within 72 hours,” the statement said. It is noted that this step was a response to the expulsion of the Russian diplomat from Bulgaria.
In mid-December it became known that the Bulgarian authorities had decided to expel the Russian diplomat. He was accused of breaking the law: the Russian was allegedly engaged in espionage since 2017. The diplomat was caught in an attempt to obtain classified military information, including regarding the number of American troops deployed in Bulgaria.
The Russian embassy in Sofia clarified that it was a military, air force and naval attaché. The diplomatic mission also stressed that the expulsion of the diplomat “is groundless and does not contribute to the development of a dialogue between the two countries in the military sphere.”
