Russian official berates foreign embassies over rent arrears
Moscow, 24 August: A Russian Foreign Ministry official has put the US embassy in Moscow among the less scrupulous
players on the Russian real estate market.
"In the cinema or music world, they award a kind of anti-prize to those who have had the worst achievements in
their area of activity. If such an award existed on the real estate market, the US embassy in Moscow would be candidate
number one," the chief of the Russian Foreign Ministry's Main Administration for Service to the Diplomatic
Corps, Ivan Sergeyev, said in an interview published in the August issue of the Diplomat magazine.
Sergeyev was referring to a dispute concerning the USA's rent payment for the residence of the American
ambassador in Moscow, Spaso House. [Passage omitted]
Speaking about the department's debtors, Sergeyev mentioned the embassies of Afghanistan, Palestine, Guinea, the
Republic of Guinea-Bissau, the Democratic Republic of Congo, Somalia, Chad and some other countries, which account for
over half of the entire debts of the diplomatic corps in Moscow.
Some of these countries, "as in former times, are trying to appeal to the all-forgiving attitudes of the Soviet
era" based on internationalist principles, which gives them grounds to believe that Russia's friendly feelings
towards them makes it unnecessary to pay rent payments for premises they occupy, Sergeyev said.
The department was able to reach an understanding with the Russian government so as to regard the debts that these
embassies have continued to incur as the state debts of their countries, he said.
Over the last year and the first five months of 2003, the department managed to recover debts amounting to 6.5m
dollars, Sergeyev said.
The embassies of Cameroon, Zambia, Nigeria and Kenya have cleared virtually all their debts for previous years. As
for the embassies of Mauritania, Sudan and Libya, they have been relocated to smaller premises fitting their financial
abilities, Sergeyev said.
"This practice (of relocating foreign embassies in keeping with their financial status) will be continued in the
future as well," he said.
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