The German ambassador to Chad will be expelled within 48 hours for “discourteous behaviour” and “failure to respect diplomatic customs,” the Chadian government announced on Friday.
The government “requests HEM (His Excellency, editor’s note) Jan Christian Gordon Kricke, Ambassador Extraordinary and Plenipotentiary of the Federal Republic of Germany, to leave Chadian territory within 48 hours,” government spokesman Aziz Mahamat Saleh said in a statement.
The authorities did not give details of the accusations against the ambassador.
“We have not been officially informed,” a source at the German embassy told French news agency AFP on condition of anonymity, saying she had learned of the statement on social networks. “If this is the case, we will be informed at embassy level,” she added.
Kricke has been ambassador to Chad since July 2021, after holding similar positions in Niger, Angola and the Philippines. He has also served as Germany’s special representative for the Sahel.
A Chadian government source told AFP on condition of anonymity that the authorities had criticised the diplomat for, among other things, “interfering too much” in the “governance of the country,” and “remarks tending to divide Chadians.” Kricke had received several “calls to order,” the source said.
When contacted, the German Embassy did not immediately respond.
