The Vrbětice case will affect relations between the Czechia and Russia

The Vrbětice case will also affect trade relations between the Czech Republic and Russia. The Czech Republic will most likely not send a so-called safety questionnaire to Russia as part of a tender for the completion of the Dukovany nuclear power plant. This would practically mean the exclusion of the Russian state-owned company Rosatom from participating in this contract. It is a reaction to Saturday's release of information from security services that the Russian GRU intelligence service was supposed to take part in the explosion of ammunition depots in Vrbětice in 2014. The e15.cz server informed about it. "The tender will be decided by the future government. We are preparing a security assessment and I cannot imagine that we would contact Rosatom after the last events. The probability that he will be invited to the tender is therefore minimal," Minister of Industry and Trade Karel Havlíček told E15. According to information from the surroundings of the Czech Prime Minister Andrej Babiš, it is possible to assume that the government will decide on the exclusion of Rosatom from the preparation of the tender within a few days. On Sunday, Deputy Prime Minister Jan Hamáček told the Czech television program Otázky Václava Moravec that the Russians should not participate in the tender for the completion of Dukovian even in consortia with other companies. According to economists, Russia's involvement in the explosion of the ammunition depot in Vrbětice will cool trade relations between the Czech Republic and Russia. However, according to them, it is premature to say to what extent the case will affect the Czech-Russian business. "Now we have to wait for the European Union's approach to Russia. Whether economic sanctions will be applied and what they will look like. However, trade relations may cool down in one way or another," Raiffeisenbank analyst Helena Horská told E15. She added that the case will have an impact on the energy sector in the first place.