The Russian Government has warned that it will respond in a "proportionate but painful" manner to the recent expulsion of four representatives of its diplomatic mission in Austria, a decision adopted by the Viennese authorities, as this Saturday the Russian Deputy Foreign Minister, Dmitri Liubinski, stated in comments to the state agency TASS.
Liubinski has stressed that any hostile gesture coming from the Austrian Government "has always received and will continue to receive a proportional response from the Russian side," insisting that although the reaction Moscow is preparing will be "inevitably painful for Vienna," this is not an initiative sought by Russia, but rather a response that is required.
These remarks come about two weeks after the Austrian Ministry of Foreign Affairs declared last 23 October persona 'non grata' to four members of the Russian diplomatic delegation and ordered them to leave the country, accusing them of being involved in activities considered inappropriate for the functions they performed.
Among those expelled are three diplomats attached to the Russian Embassy in Austria, identified for participating in "activities incompatible with their diplomatic status," as well as a member of Russia’s delegation to the OSCE for Military Security and Arms Control, who has also been sanctioned for the same reason.
The Russian diplomatic mission in Vienna had already reproached Austria for continuing to follow "blindly" the collective "anti-Russian" line of Western countries and warned then that "these actions would inevitably have an appropriate response," without for now providing specific details about the type of measures Moscow might take as retaliation.