You're reading: Moscow protests Warsaw’s ban on ‘Roads of Victory’ motor rally

Russia has expressed its protest to Poland over the ban of a Russian motorcycle ride across Europe under a trumped-up pretext.

"We are outraged by the Polish authorities' rejection of our request to provide assistance in getting necessary permits in relation to the events planned in the Polish territory in April 27-29 as part of the 'Roads of Victory' motor rally held by the 'Russian motorcyclists' group in honor of the 70th anniversary of the Victory in the Great Patriotic War," the Russian Foreign Ministry said on its website on Friday evening.

“The Polish authorities disrupted this memorial ride under the
trumped-up pretext of ‘[the organizers] having provided belated and
insufficient information’ about rally. This is an obvious lie,” the
ministry said.

The required information was provided “in sufficient volume and on
time, and to requests to specify these or other rally parameters or to
provide further information about the participating bikers, the Russian
side responded immediately,” the ministry said.

“Tellingly, the refusal by Polish authorities was the only one along
the entire itinerary of the planned Russian motorcycle ride across
Europe. Obviously, the decision is politically motivated. Consider
remarks by high-ranking Polish politicians who saw the Russian
motorcyclists’ intention to celebrate the anniversary of the Victory
over fascism as some ‘provocative idea’,” the ministry said.

“The local authorities could not even be persuaded by Polish bikers,
including participants of the so-called Katyn motor rallies regularly
held in our country, who in their appeal to the Polish Foreign Ministry
opposed Russia’s constructiveness to Warsaw’s obstructionism and
expressed their readiness to accompany their Russian counterparts across
Poland,” the ministry said.

“We express our resolute protest over the decision by the Polish
authorities with whom the most noble of aims raises an absolutely
inadequate reaction,” the ministry said.