MIND GAMES

Russia Says U.S. Diplomats Were Drunk, Not Drugged

Personnel in drugging scandal may “have only themselves to blame.”

Russia’s foreign ministry has responded to recent accusations that U.S. diplomats were drugged by Russian security services by implying the diplomats in question were drunk. The claim, made Tuesday by Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Sergei Ryabkov, came in response to a U.S. State Department report that two U.S. officials were drugged last year while attending a conference in St. Petersburg. Ryabkov said in an official statement that an “investigation” conducted by the Russian side found that no Americans had sought medical treatment for any alleged drugging. “If they had, contrary to expectations, had a little too much to drink in a hotel bar, then they only would have themselves to blame,” he said. The drugging accusations are just the latest episode in what the State Department has described as a well-orchestrated campaign against U.S. diplomats by Russia’s security services.