Russian Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova (Photo: Reuters).
Russian Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova criticized Bulgaria in strong terms on November 30, after the Southeast European country refused to allow a plane carrying Russian Foreign Minister Lavrov to fly through its airspace.
The plane was then forced to take a further detour to take Mr Lavrov and Ms Zakharova to Greece for a meeting of foreign ministers from the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE) in Skopje, North Macedonia.
Ms Zakharova, who is under European Union sanctions, said her presence on the plane was the reason given by the Bulgarian Foreign Ministry for refusing to let the plane carrying Mr Lavrov through its airspace.
Bulgaria has not commented on this information.
Ms Zakharova accused Bulgaria of anti-Russian sentiment and "this is the first time a government has not banned the plane but the people on board".
Ms Zakharova warned that Russia could impose similar flight bans on "thousands of NATO officials" flying through its airspace and accused Bulgaria of setting a "dangerous precedent".
Earlier, Ukraine, Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania announced a boycott of the OSCE foreign ministers' meeting in Skopje to protest the presence of the Russian delegation.
Commenting on this, Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Alexander Grushko said that the three Baltic countries' absence from the meeting would not affect the OSCE. Russia also affirmed that it would attend the meeting with the desire to bring the organization back to its original principles of security and cooperation.
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