MOSCOW (Reuters) – Russia said on Wednesday that it would expel one correspondent and one cameraman from Germany’s ARD in a symmetrical response to German moves against journalists from Russia’s Channel One.
Channel One reported that Germany was closing its Berlin bureau and that two Russian journalists, a correspondent and cameraman, working for the channel had been ordered to leave Germany on security grounds.
“In response to the ban by German authorities on the presence and work of Channel One correspondents, we are forced to take reciprocal measures against journalists from the Moscow office of the German media group ARD,” Russian Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova told reporters.
She said the two ARD staff had been ordered to hand over their accreditation documents and to leave Russia.
However, Zakharova said Moscow would consider accrediting new ARD journalists if Germany provided conditions for their Russian counterparts from Channel One to carry out “normal work” there.
(Reporting by Dmitry Antonov, writing by Felix Light and Mark Trevelyan; Editing by Gareth Jones)
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