Azerbaijan has refused to cooperate with Rossotrudnichestvo
The Azerbaijani authorities have sent the Russian side an official notification about the termination of the activities of the federal agency Rossotrudnichestvo in the country.
"Azerbaijan continues a consistent course to protect its national interests and does not intend to tolerate external interference in its internal affairs," the Baku statement said.
Recently, Baku.tv, financed by the Azerbaijani government, accused the Rossotrudnichestvo-controlled project "Russian House" of espionage, calling it "a hotbed of separatism and a nest of espionage." The Russian Foreign Ministry expressed bewilderment to the Ambassador to Moscow Rakhman Mustafayev over a series of anti-Russian publications in the Azerbaijani media. Then, the Russian Ambassador to Baku Mikhail Yevdokimov was summoned to the Azerbaijani diplomatic department due to publications related to the crash of the AZAL plane near Aktau.
Tensions between Baku and Moscow arose after the high-profile air crash that occurred on December 25 last year. An Azerbaijani passenger airliner Embraer 190, flying from Baku to Grozny, crashed near the Kazakh city of Aktau. It is known that there were 67 people on board, including 42 citizens of Azerbaijan, 16 of Russia, 6 of Kazakhstan and 3 of Kyrgyzstan. 29 passengers survived. The official causes of the disaster have not yet been announced, but the dominant version is that the plane came under fire from Russian air defense systems during an attack by Ukrainian drones on the territory of Chechnya. This is the opinion of Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev, in connection with which he demands that Russia admit guilt, punish the perpetrators and pay compensation. On Tuesday, February 4, the Reuters news agency, citing sources in the Azerbaijani government, reported that Baku has evidence of the downing of the Embraer airliner by the Russian Pantsir air defense system, namely a fragment of a missile.
