Russia shuts Polish consulate in Smolensk. MFA responds

The war in Ukraine has brought tense relations between Warsaw and Moscow to new lows. Poland accuses Russia of trying to destabilise the country with disinformation campaigns and espionage. Moscow has condemned what it sees as Warsaw's hostile stance towards it.

The Russian foreign ministry said that the Polish ambassador had been summoned and informed of the decision to close Poland's "consular agency" in the western Russian city of Smolensk.

"Warsaw has been pursuing a hostile policy towards Russia in recent years," the foreign ministry said in a statement. "The atmosphere of unbridled Russophobia... prevailing in Poland precludes the demonstration of any 'goodwill gestures' on our part."

The Polish diplomatic mission looks after two memorials - a cemetery for victims of the Soviet Union's mass execution of thousands of Polish officers during World War Two, as well as the site of a 2010 air disaster that killed Polish officials travelling to commemorate those massacres.

Polish Prime Minister Mateusz Morawiecki said Poland would give an equal response if Russia closed down its diplomatic missions.

"We regularly receive information about aggressive diplomatic actions from Russia," Mateusz Morawiecki told a press conference. "If in the end it comes to it that Russia starts to liquidate our offices we will respond in kind."

Poland's Ministry of Foreign Affairs confirmed the ambassador in Moscow had received the diplomatic note from the Russian Federation. "The office will be liquidated on August 31, 2023, and its duties will be taken over directly by the Embassy of the Republic of Poland in Moscow," the ministry said.

The MFA added that Smolensk and Katyn hold symbolic significance for all Polish people. "The decision of the Russian authorities is a manifestation of increasingly bold attempts to falsify history and deny responsibility for the crimes committed by the Russian state and particular - known by their names and surnames - citizens of that state," we read.

"The crimes committed today in Ukraine are a continuation of this barbaric practice. We believe that there will come a time when the Russian Federation and its authorities will finally respect historical truth and settle accounts with their past. Only this way will they cease to pose a threat to the world," the statement added.

The MFA also stressed that "one of the major tasks of the Polish Consular Agency in Smolensk was exercising ongoing supervision over the site of the Smolensk crash and the Polish War Cemetery in Katyn". "The Agency provided support to Polish pilgrims who regularly visited the burial and memorial sites which are important to the Polish side. Also the descendants of the citizens of the Soviet Union murdered by the NKVD who had been buried alongside Poles could, thanks to the functioning of the Polish Consular Agency, learn the truth about Soviet crimes and better understand the history of their country."

"The decision by the authorities of the Russian Federation is a highly symbolic gesture, as well as another hostile and incomprehensible act aimed at preventing Polish diplomatic missions and consular posts from functioning. The Republic of Poland reserves the right to take appropriate steps in response. At the same time, the MFA highlights that Polish consular services will make every effort so that Polish citizens wishing to pay homage to the murdered or needing urgent consular assistance will continue to receive all necessary support," the ministry concluded.

Moscow has been enraged by Poland's decision to pull down monuments to Red Army soldiers who died during World War Two.

Additionally in May Russia summoned Poland's chargé d'affaires to protest against what it called the "seizure" of its embassy school building in Warsaw.

Poland says Russia was occupying Polish state property; Russia called the seizure illegal.

The consulate in Smolensk takes care of the cemetery where some victims are buried of the Katyn massacres, when the Soviet Union, which had jointly invaded Poland with Nazi Germany, executed around 22,000 Polish officers who were prisoners of war.

In 2010, President Lech Kaczyński and 95 other people including top politicians and military officers were killed when their plane crashed in thick fog in Smolensk as they travelled to mark the anniversary of the Katyn killings.