“The Polish city of Gdansk cannot take over the building of the former Russian consulate, because the embassy of the Russian Federation informed in a letter to the Gdańsk city council that the former Russian consulate “will be occupied by an administrative and technical employee of the embassy.””, — write: www.pravda.com.ua
Source: “European Truth”, RMF24
Details: On November 19, the head of the Polish Foreign Ministry, Radoslaw Sikorski, announced that he had made a decision to withdraw the permission for the operation of the Russian consulate in Gdańsk. According to the Polish Ministry of Foreign Affairs, until midnight on December 23 this year the consulate should be closed, and its employees should leave the territory of Poland.
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At Monday’s press conference, the Vice Mayor of Gdansk, Emilia Lodzinski, reported that the Embassy of the Russian Federation sent a letter to the Gdansk City Administration, in which it was reported that the real estate at the address of Stefan Batory 13 and 15 in Gdańsk, where the Russian consulate was located until now, “an administrative and technical employee of the embassy will live.” In this regard, “we will not be able to physically move these immovable objects”, added Lodzinska.
According to the data contained in the registers, the owner of both real estate objects is the State Treasury. “The claims of the Russian side that the real estate belongs to them are false and untrue,” Lodzinska stressed.
The deputy governor of the Pomeranian Voivodeship, Emil Rojek, added that the Russians “consider that they have civil-law claims to this building, which have the right of perpetual use, and on this basis they refuse to hand it over”.
Russian diplomats occupied the consulate since the post-war period. In 1951, the People’s Republic of Poland and the Soviet Union signed an agreement on the free use of the building. After the collapse of the USSR, the real estate became the property of the State Treasury.
For decades, Russians treated the villa on Batory Street as their property. They did not pay for the use of the building, despite the fact that in 2013 the city began to charge a fee in accordance with the instructions of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs. The consulate did not pay debts and did not respond to calls.
Gdansk estimated the debt for the years 2013-2023 at approximately 5.5 million zlotys, and together with interest – another 3 million zlotys. The case went to the court, which obliged Russia to pay almost 400,000 zlotys for part of the debt.
Poland decided to close the Russian consulate in Gdańsk in response to two diversions on the railway between Lublin and Warsaw.
After that, Russia withdrew consent for the work of the Consulate General of Poland in Irkutsk.