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| Russia 'regret' over attack on Dutch diplomat | Russia 'regret' over attack on Dutch diplomat |
| (35 minutes later) | |
| Russia's foreign ministry has expressed regret after a Dutch diplomat was beaten up in Moscow. | Russia's foreign ministry has expressed regret after a Dutch diplomat was beaten up in Moscow. |
| The Dutch foreign ministry summoned Russia's ambassador to explain after the diplomat was attacked in his flat. | |
| The incident comes amid rising tensions between the two countries. | The incident comes amid rising tensions between the two countries. |
| Last week Russia protested about the arrest of one of its diplomats in the Netherlands, and the Dutch have complained about Russia's detention of a Dutch-flagged Greenpeace ship. | Last week Russia protested about the arrest of one of its diplomats in the Netherlands, and the Dutch have complained about Russia's detention of a Dutch-flagged Greenpeace ship. |
| Ironically, 2013 was declared the "Netherlands Russia Year", with events designed to strengthen bilateral friendships, the BBC's Anna Holligan reports from The Hague. | |
| 'Regret' | |
| The diplomat, Onno Elderenbosch, was slightly injured in the attack on Tuesday night, Dutch Foreign Minister Frans Timmermans said. | |
| Mr Timmermans said he had summoned the Russian ambassador for an explanation. | |
| "Our people have to be able to work safely and I want guarantees that the Russian authorities will accept their responsibilities on that point," he wrote on Facebook. | |
| Expressing its regret, Russia's foreign ministry said police in Moscow were taking every measure to find and apprehend the culprits. | |
| Mr Elderenbosch was overpowered by two men posing as electricians who had told him there was no light on his floor and asked if they could check the electricity in his apartment, the Russian tabloid Life News reports. | |
| "When the diplomat opened the door, he was hit in the back and he fell, hitting his head on the floor," it quoted a security source as saying. | |
| "The intruders then bound him and turned the apartment upside down." | |
| The attackers also reportedly daubed a heart on a mirror in lipstick with the letters LGBT, an abbreviation for "lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender", a police source told Russia's Interfax news agency. | |
| After the detention of a Greenpeace crew on board a Dutch vessel last month, the Dutch government initiated legal action against Russia. The activists were protesting against plans to drill for oil in the Arctic. | |
| Last week Dutch police entered the home of a Russian diplomat in The Hague and took him into custody, after neighbours reported hearing a row inside. | |
| The Dutch foreign minister later apologised for breaking the rules of the Vienna Convention that recognise diplomatic immunity. |