Konstantin van Vloten set up an office in Strijthagen Castle, owned by his friend, artist Alexander Taratynov. The diplomat described the major war in Ukraine as a “peace mission” and believed Russia had been “too soft” for the past 30 years.
Russia’s Honorary Consul to the Netherlands Konstantin van Vloten will leave Strijthagen Castle in Landgraaf. The building has been home to the consular office since early February, De Volkskrant reported on March 2.
“The Russian ambassador has decided that the consulate is no longer located in the castle,” said owner artist Alexander Taratynov, who has Russian and Dutch citizenship.
Taratynov is an acquaintance of van Vloten. He complained of threats from activists who promised to destroy his property and works of art if the consulate of the Russian Federation did not evacuate the castle. Landgraaf Town Hall has received complaints from local residents and politicians.
Van Vloten publicly supported the moves of Russian President Vladimir Putin. In one of his interviews with Dutch media last year, he described Russia’s all-out war with Ukraine as a “peace mission”. For him, Russia has been “too soft” for the past 30 years.
Following these statements, the Maastricht city council, where the consulate was located, banned its activities.
In February, Taratynov decided to place the consulate in his castle, but did not formalize this on paper. Journalists state that the artist cares about maintaining relations between Russia and the Netherlands even during the war, and wants to offer people an opportunity for dialogue in the castle.
According to the publication, several Russian diplomats were told to leave the Netherlands last week. The Russian Federation’s trade mission in Amsterdam was closed, and the Ministry of Foreign Affairs authorized the relocation of the consulate to Landgraaf.
Limburger added that Van Vloten lived in the castle with his wife, Catherine, that there was a consulate in the municipality, and that Limburger had received more than a hundred refugees from Ukraine.
Dutch Honorary Consul of the Russian Federation served the palaces
Konstantin van Vloten, their company in St. He is a Russian businessman who provides catering services in St. Petersburg. In an interview with the Nieuwsblad newspaper on March 15, 2014, he said that he served the Pavlovsk and Catherine’s Palaces, a complex of greenhouses and Peterhof Park, the State Russian Museum and the Menshikov Palace, a branch of the famous Hermitage.
He bought the 18th-century Château de la Mothe in Belgium and lived there for about 20 years. The authors noted that Van Vloten was familiar with the former president and deputy head of the Security Council of Russia, Dmitry Medvedev.
Recall that on the anniversary of the great invasion on February 24, Polish and Ukrainian activists in Warsaw held a rally near the building where the employees of the Russian embassy lived. Activists woke them up with explosions and alarms.
On February 2, the Austrian government decided to expel 4 Russian diplomats, their actions were considered incompatible with diplomatic status.
In December last year, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky appointed the new Ukrainian ambassador to Bulgaria, Olesya Ilashchuk, on Friday. The media wrote that she was never associated with diplomacy and described herself as a “sexology and jewelry expert”.
Source: Focus
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