{"id":1326,"date":"2026-04-13T13:55:08","date_gmt":"2026-04-13T13:55:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/poland\/1326\/"},"modified":"2026-04-13T13:55:08","modified_gmt":"2026-04-13T13:55:08","slug":"poland-orders-the-russian-consulate-in-krakow-closed-after-moscow-was-blamed-for-a-2024-arson-attack","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/poland\/1326\/","title":{"rendered":"Poland orders the Russian Consulate in Krakow closed after Moscow was blamed for a 2024 arson attack"},"content":{"rendered":"

WARSAW, Poland (AP) \u2014 Poland\u2019s foreign minister said Monday that he was ordering the closure of the Russian Consulate in the southern city of Krakow, after authorities blamed Moscow<\/a> for a fire that destroyed a shopping center in Warsaw last year.<\/p>\n

The national prosecutor\u2019s office also said Monday that it had pressed charges against two Ukrainian citizens who cooperated with the people who carried out the arson, identifying them only as Daniil B. and Oleksander V.<\/p>\n

The fire<\/a> broke out May 12, 2024, in the Marywilska 44 shopping center that housed around 1,400 shops and service points, a budget marketplace in a warehouse-like structure in a northern district of Warsaw. Many of the vendors were from Vietnam, and it inflicted tragedy<\/a> on many in Warsaw\u2019s Vietnamese community.<\/p>\n

\u201cThis was a huge fire of a shopping mall in Warsaw in which, just by sheer luck, nobody was hurt. This is completely unacceptable,\u201d Foreign Minister Radek Sikorski said. \u201cSo the Russian Consulate will have to leave. And if these attacks continue, we\u2019ll take further action.\u201d<\/p>\n

Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov described the accusations as being groundless and rooted in anti-Russia sentiment. He also said that Warsaw\u2019s decision to close the consulate would damage bilateral relations between Russia and Poland, which Peskov described as already being in \u201ca deplorable state.\u201d <\/p>\n

\u201cPoland is choosing hostility against us,\u201d he told journalists on Monday.<\/p>\n

Last year, Sikorski already ordered the closure<\/a> of the Russian Consulate in Poznan, one of three at the time in Poland, in response to acts of sabotage<\/a>, including arson attacks that he said were sponsored by Moscow.<\/p>\n

This leaves only one Russian Consulate in Poland, in the city of Gdansk.<\/p>\n

There are rising concerns in Europe over Russian attempts to destabilize the region through covert operations. <\/p>\n

Countries along NATO\u2019s eastern flank, like Poland and the Baltic states, feel especially vulnerable. In March, Lithuania accused Russia<\/a> of carrying out an arson attack at an IKEA store in the capital, Vilnius, last year.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"WARSAW, Poland (AP) \u2014 Poland\u2019s foreign minister said Monday that he was ordering the closure of the Russian…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":1327,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[1203,1201,1205,1202,1200,329,56,9,479,1199,1206,126,1204,45,331],"class_list":{"0":"post-1326","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-krakow","8":"tag-arson","9":"tag-crime","10":"tag-dmitry-peskov","11":"tag-fires","12":"tag-gdansk","13":"tag-general-news","14":"tag-krakow","15":"tag-poland","16":"tag-poland-government","17":"tag-radek-sikorski","18":"tag-retail-and-wholesale","19":"tag-russia","20":"tag-russia-government","21":"tag-warsaw","22":"tag-world-news"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/poland\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1326","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/poland\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/poland\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/poland\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/poland\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1326"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/poland\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1326\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/poland\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/1327"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/poland\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1326"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/poland\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1326"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/poland\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1326"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}