Prague, April 3 (CTK) – Russia’s negative reaction to the extradition of alleged hacker Yevgenyi Nikulin to the United States is “no surprise” as it could be expected, the Czech Foreign Ministry said on Twitter on Tuesday.
The extradition of Nikulin to the USA was a sovereign decision of the Czech Republic, relying on independent courts, including the Constitutional Court, the ministry tweeted.
Nikulin was extradited to the USA last week. The USA charged him with massive hacking related to social networks. Russia asked for his extradition, too, based on a suspected online theft. Czech Justice Minister Robert Pelikan, who had the final say in the case, said the U.S. request was more substantiated than the Russian.
On Monday, Moscow expressed outrage over the extradition to the USA and said the step was politically motivated and undermined Russian-Czech cooperation. According to the Russian Foreign Ministry, the Czech step was not based on law but on an attempt to show loyalty with its allies which has recently become its absolute priority.
The Czech police arrested Nikulin in October 2016 based on an U.S. warrant. The USA suspects him of hacking attacks on the LinkedIn and Formspring social networks and the Dropbox file hosting service.