(Bloomberg) -- The Czech Republic expelled two Russian diplomats over fabricated information on an alleged poisoning plot, bringing relations between the NATO member and its former Soviet-era master to a new low.
The expulsions are the culmination of increasingly thorny diplomatic relations between Prague and Moscow. They worsened in April after media reported that several city leaders could be the target of Russian assassination attempts by poisoning. Russia rejected the allegations as absurd.
On Friday, Czech Prime Minister Andrej Babis said a staff member at Russia's embassy in Prague had made up the story about the planned attack as part of a conflict inside the mission and delivered it to Czech intelligence services.
Read more: Downing of a Soviet-Era Statue Spawns Rumors of a Russian Plot
By doing so, the diplomat further complicated Czech-Russian relations and damaged the reputation of the Russian Federation in the Czech Republic, Babis said.
“Of course, we're interested in good relations with all countries, but we're a sovereign state and such actions on our soil are unacceptable,” he said in a televised briefing.
Russia quickly denounced the Czech move and called it a “fabricated provocation” to which it will retaliate in a proportionate manner.
“This hostile step, which was from the beginning based on unfounded media accusations, is evidence that Prague isn't interested in normalizing Russian-Czech relations,” the embassy said on its website.
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