RUSSIA - UK

Russia restricts visas for British Council staff

Monday, January 14, 2008

Russia said it was putting "legal pressure" on the British Council, including visa sanctions, after the council reopened two regional offices in defiance of a Russian ban.

MOSCOW, Jan 14 (Reuters) - Russia announced on Monday it
will not issue new entry visas to staff working in the British
government's cultural offices in two regions, sharpening a row
that has soured already-poor relations.


Russia ordered the British Council to halt work at the two
regional offices from Jan. 1 in a move both sides have linked to
a diplomatic feud over the murder of Alexander Litvinenko, a
Russian emigre critical of the Kremlin.


Britain has called the Russian order illegal and on Monday
the two offices, in St Petersburg and Yekaterinburg, resumed
work after the long New Year break, Reuters correspondents in
both cities said.


Russia's Foreign Ministry summoned British ambassador Tony
Brenton on Monday and soon after issued a statement blasting
Britain for defying the order and keeping its offices open.


"Russia views such actions as an intentional provocation
aimed at inflaming tensions in Russian-British relations," the
Foreign Ministry said in a statement posted on its www.mid.ru
Web site.


"The Russian side will not issue visas to new employees sent
to work in the (British) consular offices of St Petersburg and
Yekaterinburg to carry out British Council work" the statement
said.


The British ambassador, leaving the Foreign Ministry after
his talks with officials, said the British Council would
continue its operations in Russia's regions.


British officials say the Russian move against the British
Council is linked to the dispute over Litvinenko's 2006 murder
by radiation poisoning in London, an episode that has driven
relations to their lowest level since the Cold War.


Britain named former KGB bodyguard Andrei Lugovoy as its
suspect in Litvinenko's murder, and in July Britain expelled
four Russian diplomats over Moscow's refusal to extradite
Lugovoy. Russia expelled four British diplomats in response.





LITVINENKO LINK


The head of the British Council in Russia, James Kennedy,
told Reuters in an interview on Monday that Moscow had made the
dispute a political one.


"We haven't made this link, that link has been made by the
Russian authorities," Kennedy told Reuters when asked about a
connection to the Litvinenko case.


"We, at the British Council, are a non-political
organisation. We work in the field of education and culture and
we regret that this has been turned into a political dispute."


Russia says it ordered the two British Council offices to
halt their work because of long-standing concerns that their
legal status, as separate entities from the British embassy, was
not in line with Russian law.


The offices, which promote British culture abroad and
arrange educational exchanges, have also been subject to tax
investigations. But Russian officials have also made a link to
the Litvinenko affair.

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