Secretary of State Mike Pompeo in consultation with Ambassador John Sullivan decided to shut the consulate in Vladivostok in the far east and suspend operations at the consulate in Yekaterinburg, a State Department representative said in a statement emailed to Reuters on Saturday.
The decision, part of “ongoing efforts to ensure the safe and secure operation of the U.S. diplomatic mission in the Russian Federation,” did not affect Russian consulates in the United States, the statement said, without offering detailed reasons for the move.
Asked this week about Russian media reports that the two consulates might be closed, the U.S. embassy in Moscow said it had suspended operations at the Vladivostok consulate and rolled back operations in Yekaterinburg in March because of the pandemic.
