MOSCOW, December 25 (RAPSI) – All diplomats accused of state medical insurance fraud in the US have already returned to Russia, Deputy Foreign Minister Sergei Ryabkov told Voice of Russia radio on Wednesday.

According to Ryabkov, the United States violated the Vienna Convention on Diplomatic Relations in this case.

On December 6, US prosecutors announced that 49 former and current Russian diplomats and their wives have been charged in connection with a widespread health care fraud scheme.

According to the statement issued earlier by the US Attorney for the Southern District of New York: "The complaint alleges that each of the defendants and their unnamed co-conspirators participated in a widespread scheme to illegally obtain Medicaid benefits for prenatal care and related costs by, among other things, falsely underreporting their income or falsely claiming that their child was a citizen of the United States."

The statement adds that the defendants are alleged to have illegally obtained nearly half a million dollars' worth of Medicaid benefits.

According to the statement, each of the defendants either presently is or formerly was a Russian diplomat or spouse of a diplomat employed by the Russian Mission to the United Nations (UN), the Russian Consulate General in New York, or the New York office of the Trade Representation of the Russian Federation in the US.