MOSCOW, May 4 (RIA Novosti) - Moscow is in favor of settling traffic violations by Russian and foreign diplomats in Russia and elsewhere in a constructive way, the Foreign Ministry said Thursday.
The attache at Russia's permanent UN mission in New York, Ilya Morozov, was forced to leave the United States after local police accused him of driving on a section of the road closed for repairs.
"Russia seeks to resolve such incidents in a constructive cooperation, avoiding any speculation and unnecessary fuss around them," ministry spokesman Mikhail Kamynin said, adding that in general both Russian and American diplomats respected the law.
Some media reports said Morozov, 28, had also hit a traffic police officer with his car, but police did not confirm this. U.S. officials said Morozov had either to be stripped of diplomatic immunity and prosecuted, or leave the country.
"Our Interior Ministry bodies have registered several traffic violations by U.S. diplomats," Kamynin said, adding that in Moscow alone 25 grave traffic offenses had been reported in the past two years.
He also said a U.S. consul in Vladivostok in Russia's Far East had caused an accident in October 1998 that left a Russian citizen disabled. A U.S. court is now deciding on damage payments to the injured party.
