MOSCOW (AP) — Russia on Saturday announced it is expelling 23 British diplomats and threatened further measures in retaliation in a growing diplomatic dispute over a nerve agent attack on a former spy in Britain.

Britain's government said the move was expected, and that it doesn't change the British conviction that Russia was behind the poisoning of ex-agent Sergei Skripal and his daughter in the British city of Salisbury. Prime Minister Theresa May said Britain will consider next steps in the coming days alongside its allies.

The Russian Foreign Ministry ordered the 23 diplomats to leave within a week. It also said in a statement that it is ordering the closure of the British Council, a government-backed organization for cultural and scientific cooperation, and that it is ending an agreement to reopen the British consulate in St. Petersburg.

The announcement followed on the heels of Britain's order this week for 23 Russian diplomats to leave the U.K. because Russia was not cooperating in the case of the Skripals, both found March 4 poisoned by a nerve agent that British officials say was developed in Russia. The Skripals remain in critical condition.

Britain's foreign secretary accused Russian President Vladimir Putin of personally ordering the poisoning of the Skripals. Putin's spokesman denounced the claim.

The Russian statement said the government could take further measures if Britain takes any more "unfriendly" moves toward Russia. British Ambassador Laurie Bristow was called to the Foreign Ministry Saturday to be informed of the moves.

"We will always do what is necessary to defend ourselves, our allies and our values against an attack of this sort, which is an attack not only on the United Kingdom, but upon the international rules-based system on which all countries, including Russia, depend for their safety and security," Bristow told reporters after being informed of the expulsions.

"This crisis has arisen as a result of an appalling attack in the United Kingdom, the attempted murder of two people, using a chemical weapon developed in Russia and not declared by Russia at the Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons, as Russia was and is obliged to do under the Chemical Weapons Convention," he added.

Russian Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova on Saturday denied that Russia or the Soviet Union had ever developed the nerve agent Novichok that Britain said was used to poison the Skripals.

A Russian scientist disclosed details of the secret program in the 1990s, and later published the formula for Novichok. But Russia maintains it has never made them.

Speaking on Russia-24 television, Zakharova said Britain's angry reaction is connected to the war in Syria. She said Britain is taking a tough line because of frustration at recent advances of Russian-backed Syrian government forces against Western-backed rebels.

Russia argues that it has turned the tide of the international fight against Islamic State extremists by lending military backing to Syria's government. With Russian help, Syrian forces have stepped up their offensive on rebel-held areas in recent days, leaving many dead.

The British National Security Council will meet early next week to consider the next steps after Saturday's expulsion announcement.

The Foreign Office says "Russia's response doesn't change the facts of the matter — the attempted assassination of two people on British soil, for which there is no alternative conclusion other than that the Russian State was culpable."

The British Council said in a statement it is "profoundly disappointed" at its pending closure. The organization has been operating in Russia ever since the fall of the Soviet Union.

"It is our view that when political or diplomatic relations become difficult, cultural relations and educational opportunities are vital to maintain on-going dialogue between people and institutions," it said.

British police appealed Saturday for witnesses who can help investigators reconstruct the Skripals' movements in the crucial hours before they were found unconscious.

Western powers see the attack as the latest sign of alleged Russian meddling abroad. The tensions threaten to overshadow Putin's expected re-election Sunday for another six-year presidential term.

Meanwhile new tensions have surfaced over the death this week of a London-based Russian businessman, Nikolai Glushkov. British police said Friday that he died from compression to the neck and opened a murder investigation.

Russia also suspects foul play in Glushkov's death and opened its own inquiry Friday.

British police said there is no apparent link between the attack on Glushkov and the poisoning of the Skripals, but both have raised alarm in the West at a time when Russia is increasingly assertive on the global stage and facing investigations over alleged interference in the Donald Trump's election as U.S. president.

Lawless contributed from London. Jim Heintz in Moscow contributed to this story.

Copyright 2017 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.</s>MOSCOW — Russia on Saturday announced it is expelling 23 British diplomats and threatened further measures in retaliation in a growing diplomatic dispute over a nerve agent attack on a former spy in Britain.

The Russian Foreign Ministry also said in a statement that it is ordering the closure of the British Council, a government organization for cultural and scientific co-operation, and that it is ending an agreement to reopen the British consulate in St. Petersburg.

It ordered the diplomats to leave within a week.

The announcement followed on the heels of Britain’s order this week for 23 Russian diplomats to leave the U.K. because Russia was not co-operating in the case of Sergei Skripal and his daughter, both found March 4 poisoned by a nerve agent that British officials say was developed in Russia. The Skripals remain in critical condition.

Britain’s foreign secretary accused Russian President Vladimir Putin of personally ordering the poisoning of the Skripals. Putin’s spokesman denounced the claim.

The Russian statement said the government could take further measures if Britain takes any more “unfriendly” moves toward Russia. British Ambassador Laurie Bristow was called to the Foreign Ministry Saturday morning to be informed of the moves.

“We will always do what is necessary to defend ourselves, our allies and our values against an attack of this sort, which is an attack not only on the United Kingdom, but upon the international rules-based system on which all countries, including Russia, depend for their safety and security,” Bristow told reporters after being informed of the expulsions.

“This crisis has arisen as a result of an appalling attack in the United Kingdom, the attempted murder of two people, using a chemical weapon developed in Russia and not declared by Russia at the Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons, as Russia was and is obliged to do under the Chemical Weapons Convention,” he added.

“It is possible that (Britain) will continue to respond; we are ready for this. But London must understand that this will not do anything, it is useless to talk with Russia with such methods,” Dzhabarov was quoted as saying by the state news agency RIA Novosti.

While Russia has vigorously denied involvement in the attack, Western powers see it as the latest sign of alleged Russian meddling abroad. The tensions threaten to overshadow Putin’s expected re-election Sunday for another six-year presidential term.

Meanwhile new tensions have surfaced over the death this week of a London-based Russian businessman, Nikolai Glushkov. British police said Friday that he died from compression to the neck and opened a murder investigation.

Russia also suspects foul play in Glushkov’s death and opened its own inquiry Friday.

British police said there is no apparent link between the attack on Glushkov and the poisoning of the Skripals, but both have raised alarm in the West at a time when Russia is increasingly assertive on the global stage and facing investigations over alleged interference in the Donald Trump’s election as U.S. president.

The source of the nerve agent — which Britain says is Soviet-made Novichok — is unclear, as is the way it was administered. Russia has demanded that Britain share samples collected by investigators.

Top EU diplomats were expected to discuss next steps at a meeting Monday, with some calling for a boycott of the upcoming World Cup in Russia. British Prime Minister Theresa May is seeking a global coalition of countries to punish Moscow.

Jim Heintz in Moscow contributed to this story.</s>iStock/Thinkstock(MOSCOW) — Russia expelled 23 British diplomats on Saturday in a tit-for-tat response to the U.K.’s expulsion of 23 Russian embassy staff over the nerve-agent attack in England last week.

Russia’s foreign ministry said in a statement it had summoned U.K. ambassador Laurie Bristow to inform him that the 23 diplomats were now “persona non grata” and had a week to leave. The ministry said it was also closing the British consulate in Saint Petersburg and withdrawing the right of the British Council, a body that promotes British culture and language, to operate in Russia.

The Russian foreign ministry said it was taking the measures in response to what it called the U.K.’s “provocative actions and unfounded accusations” over the poisoning case.

The expulsion marks the latest turn in a confrontation between Russia and the U.K. following the poisoning of former Russian spy Sergey Skripal and his daughter Yulia in the southern English town of Salisbury. The U.K. has accused Russia of bearing responsibility for the attack, which British officials say involved a military-grade nerve agent of a type developed secretly by Russia. British Prime Minister Theresa May has also cut off high-level contacts with Russia and has been trying to build support among the U.K.’s allies for potential fresh sanctions to punish Russia.

Russia has denied the U.K.’s allegations, accusing Britain of using the incident in a campaign to smear Moscow. Russian officials have increasingly begun suggesting the attack could have been staged by Britain itself. On Saturday, Russia’s envoy to the Organisation for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW), Alexander Shigulin alleged to the news agency Interfax the “most likely” source of the nerve agent was Britain or the United States. He did not offer evidence for that assertion.

U.K. officials have said a nerve agent from Russia’s so-called Novichok program was used to target Skripal. First revealed by a Russian whistleblower in the early 1990s, the Novichoks were part of a secret Russian effort to develop a new generation of more powerful and harder to detect nerve agents.

Russia has now denied that any program under the name Novichok ever existed, despite the evidence presented two decades ago by the Russian scientist Vil Mirzayanov, who revealed its existence after becoming concerned it violated Russia’s commitments to the Chemical Weapons Convention. Russian officials had previously said that Russia had destroyed the Novichok weapons when it had dismantled its chemical arsenal, which was completed last year.

The chairman of the U.K. parliament’s foreign affairs committee said that Russia’s decision to expel the U.K. diplomats was “hardly surprising.”

“This is really absolutely symbolic and typical of a Russian Federation that has used lying and propaganda as a means of warfare and is now repeating its style,” Conservative party Member of Parliament Tom Tugendhat said on BBC Radio 4.

“It’s a great shame for the Russian people that they’re closing the British Council, which has done an awful lot to educate Russian people in English language and help them get jobs and opportunities around the world,” he added.

On Friday, the U.K.’s foreign minister, Boris Johnson, blamed Russian President Vladimir Putin personally for the attack, telling an audience, “We think it overwhelmingly likely that it was his decision to direct the use of a nerve agent on the streets of the U.K., on the streets of Europe, for the first time since the second World War.”

The Skripals remain in a critical condition following the attack that also poisoned a British police officer. The officer is reportedly now in stable condition.

Sergey Skripal worked as a spy for Britain’s MI6 agency while serving in Russian military intelligence in the late 1990s. He was arrested and convicted of treason by Russia, but was pardoned and exchanged in a spy swap in 2010, after which he lived the U.K. The case has drawn obvious parallels with the murder of Alexander Litvinenko, a dissident former Russian intelligence officer who was killed with a radioactive poison in London in 2006. A British public inquiry found Putin had “probably” ordered that assassination.

Meanwhile, U.K. police have also opened a murder investigation in the death of another Russian exile living in Britain. Nikolai Glushkov was found dead at his home this week. Police said Glushkov died as a result of a “compression of the neck,” suggesting he may have been strangled.

Glushkov was an associate of oligarch and Putin foe Boris Berezovsky, who was also found dead in 2013, apparently having hung himself, though a coroner recorded an open verdict. Glushkov was granted political asylum in London after he was released from prison in Russia in 2004, where he had been jailed over fraud charges.

London’s Metropolitan police counter-terrorism command has said there is no suggestion that Glushkov’s death is connected to the poisoning attack, but that they are investigating because “of associations Mr Glushkov is believed to have had.” Detectives are keeping an “open mind” about the death, police said.</s>
• Four world leaders have issued a joint statement blaming Russia for the poisoning of Sergei Skripal, the former double agent who fell ill with his daughter in England.
• The leaders say there is "no plausible alternative explanation" to Russia being to blame.
• The statement follows days of diplomacy by UK Prime Minister Theresa May and comes amid a meeting by NATO to discuss the crisis.

LONDON — The leaders of the United States, Britain, France, and Germany have released a joint statement condemning Russia for the poisoning of Sergei Skripal in England last week.

US President Donald Trump, UK Prime Minister Theresa May, French President Emmanuel Macron, and German Chancellor Angela Merkel agreed that there was "no plausible alternative explanation" than that Russia was to blame for the attack.

The leaders described the poisoning as "the first offensive use of a nerve agent in Europe since the Second World War," adding that Russia's actions "threaten the security of us all."

The statement marks a significant ramping up of tensions with Russia and comes as members of the NATO military alliance meet to discuss the crisis.

It came after several days of diplomacy by May following initial reluctance by the French and US governments to publicly blame Russia for the incident, in which Skripal and his daughter were poisoned by what authorities identified as a Russia-developed nerve agent.

On Wednesday, May announced that Britain would expel 23 Russian diplomats from the UK in response to the attack.

Britain is also set to freeze the accounts of people close to Russian President Vladimir Putin and suspend all high-level contact with the Russian government.

On Thursday, UK Defence Secretary Gavin Williamson said Russia should "shut up" and "go away" and suggested that Britain was in a "chilly" war with the country.

Asked about the poisoning on Thursday, Trump told reporters that it "certainly looks like Russia were behind it."

A Russian foreign ministry spokeswoman hit back on Thursday describing attempts to blame Russia for the poisoning as "insane."

Maria Zakharova said she wanted to comment on "the statements made by the prime minister of Britain in parliament with completely insane accusations towards the Russian Federation, our entire country, our entire people."

She added that Russia planned to retaliate soon, saying they would "introduce reciprocal steps, without doubt... They are currently being worked on and will be adopted in the near future."</s>Russia's Foreign Ministry has summoned the British ambassador to Russia for talks in a heightening dispute over a nerve agent attack on a former spy in Britain.British Prime Minister Theresa May this week ordered 23 Russian diplomats expelled as part of measures to punish Russia over the March 4 poisoning of former spy Sergei Skripal and his daughter Yulia in the city of Salisbury. Russia is expected to announce the expulsion of some British diplomats in a retaliatory measure.British Ambassador Laurie Bristow is expected at the Russian Foreign Ministry late Saturday morning.Britain's foreign secretary accused Russian President Vladimir Putin of personally ordering the poisoning. Putin's spokesman denounced the claim.</s>Russia will expel 23 British diplomats in a tit-for-tat reaction to Theresa May’s response to the nerve agent attack on Sergei and Yulia Skripal.

The country’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs announced it had ordered the diplomats to leave within a week, moments after Britain’s ambassador to Russia Laurie Bristow left the ministry in Moscow.

Other measures included closing the British Council and scrapping an agreement to reopen the British consulate in St Petersburg, while the country indicated it could take further action should there be what it called more “unfriendly” moves, the Associated Press reported.

Mr Bristow, speaking to reporters after being summoned, said the UK would “always do what is necessary to defend ourselves, our allies and our values against an attack of this sort”.

It comes after NHS England said Detective Sergeant Nick Bailey, the police officer exposed to the Novichok agent in Salisbury, is no longer in a critical condition.

But Mr Skripal, 66, the Russian ex-spy who was the target of the attack, and his daughter Yulia, 33, remain critical but stable in hospital.

Russia has opened its own criminal investigation into the attempted murder of Yulia, a Russian citizen, and also Nikolai Glushkov, a Russian exile Scotland Yard said died from “compression to the neck” at his home in New Malden, south-west London.

British police are not linking his case with the Salisbury attack.

Speaking to the Russian state-funded RT television network, the ambassador denounced Britain’s decision to expel 23 diplomats as “unacceptable and unjustified”.

Sunday is set to mark two weeks since the incident.</s>Russia retaliated against the United Kingdom Saturday morning, announcing it would also be expelling 23 British diplomats amid the growing tensions between the two nations over the nerve agent attack on a former Kremlin spy.

The Russian Foreign Ministry said it was ordering the closure of the British Council – a government organization for cultural and scientific cooperation – as well as ending an agreement to reopen the British consulate in St. Petersburg.

British diplomats have to leave within a week.

EX-RUSSIAN SPY SERGEI SKRIPAL POISONED: WHAT TO KNOW

The statement said the government could take further measures if Britain takes any more "unfriendly" moves toward Russia.

Russia’s retaliation comes days after British Prime Minister announced the expulsion of 23 Russian diplomats following the suspicious poisoning of ex-spy Sergei Skripal and his daughter Yulia on March 4. The two remain in critical condition and in the hospital.

May said on Monday that it was “highly likely” the Kremlin is responsible for the attack, while Britain’s Foreign Minister Boris Johnson directly put the blame on Russian President Vladimir Putin.

“Our quarrel is with Putin’s Kremlin, and with this decision, and we think it overwhelmingly likely that it was his decision to direct the use of a nerve agent on the streets of the U.K., on the streets of Europe, for the first time since the Second World War,” he told reporters on Friday. “That is why we are at odds with Russia.”

While Russia has vigorously denied any involvement in the attack, Western leaders banded together earlier this week and called out the Kremlin for meddling abroad.

In a rare joint statement, the leaders of the U.S., France and Germany joined May in accusing Russia of being behind the attack.

"It is an assault on U.K. sovereignty and any such use by a State party is a clear violation of the Chemical Weapons Convention and a breach of international law. It threatens the security of us all,” the statement said.

The quartet wrote “there is no plausible alternative explanation” except Russian responsibility for the attack on British soil, and the Kremlin’s failure to respond to a “legitimate request” for an explanation “further underlines its responsibility.”

“We call on Russia to live up to its responsibilities as a member of the UN Security Council to uphold international peace and security,” the statement said.

IN JOINT STATEMENT, WORLD LEADERS AGREE RUSSIA BEHIND NERVE AGENT ATTACK ON FORMER SPY

The tensions threaten to overshadow Putin's expected re-election Sunday for another six-year presidential term.

Meanwhile, adding further strain, British police have opened a murder investigation into the suspicious death of London-based Russian businessman, Nikolai Glushkov. Authorities said Friday that he died from compression to the neck.

Russia also suspects foul play in Glushkov's death and opened its own inquiry Friday.

British police said there is no apparent link between the attack on Glushkov and the poisoning of the Skripals, but both have raised alarm in the West at a time when Russia is increasingly assertive on the global stage and facing investigations over alleged interference in the Donald Trump's election as U.S. president.

The source of the nerve agent — which Britain says is Soviet-made Novichok — is unclear, as is the way it was administered. Russia has demanded that Britain share samples collected by investigators.

Top EU diplomats were expected to discuss next steps at a meeting Monday, with some calling for a boycott of the upcoming World Cup in Russia. British Prime Minister Theresa May is seeking a global coalition of countries to punish Moscow.

The Associated Press contributed to this report.</s>MOSCOW (Reuters) – Russia expelled 23 British diplomats on Saturday in a carefully calibrated retaliatory move against London, which has accused the Kremlin of orchestrating a nerve toxin attack on a former Russian double agent and his daughter in southern England.

Escalating a crisis in relations, Russia said it was also shutting down the activities of the British Council, which fosters cultural links between the two countries, and Britain’s consulate-general in St. Petersburg.

The Russian Foreign Ministry said it was giving the 23 British diplomats one week to leave the country.

The move, which was tougher than expected, followed Britain’s decision on Wednesday to expel 23 Russian diplomats over the attack in the English city of Salisbury which left former Russian spy Sergei Skripal, 66, and his daughter Yulia Skripal, 33, critically ill in hospital.

Moscow announced the measures on the eve of a presidential election which incumbent Vladimir Putin should comfortably win. Putin has cast his country as a fortress besieged by hostile Western powers with him as its defender, and state media is likely to portray the anti-British move in that context.

The Foreign Ministry said Moscow’s measures were a response to what it called Britain’s “provocative actions and groundless accusations”. It warned London it stood ready to take further measures in the event of more “unfriendly steps”.

Relations between London and Moscow have crashed to a post-Cold War low over the Salisbury attack, the first known offensive use of a nerve agent in Europe since World War Two.

British Prime Minister Theresa May said Britain would consider its next steps alongside its allies in the coming days.

“We will never tolerate a threat to the life of British citizens and others on British soil from the Russian Government. We can be reassured by the strong support we have received from our friends and allies around the world,” May said at the Conservative Party’s spring forum in London.

The Russian Foreign Ministry summoned the British ambassador, Laurie Bristow, to a meeting on Saturday morning in central Moscow at its Stalin-era headquarters during which he was informed of the retaliatory measures.

Bristow told reporters afterwards that Britain had only expelled the Russian diplomats after Moscow had failed to explain how the nerve toxin had got to Salisbury.

Britain’s foreign ministry said it had anticipated Russia’s response and its priority now looking after its staff in Russia and assisting those that will return home.

“Russia’s response doesn’t change the facts of the matter – the attempted assassination of two people on British soil, for which there is no alternative conclusion other than that the Russian State was culpable.” it said in a statement.

Russia’s response was more robust than expected. The closure of the British Council’s Moscow office will sever cultural ties, while that of the consulate-general in St Petersburg will end Britain’s diplomatic presence in Russia’s second city.

Russian news agencies cited politicians in Russia’s upper house of parliament as welcoming the move to close the British Council, alleging it had been used as a cover by British spies.

The British Council said it was profoundly disappointed by Russia’s decision and remained committed to developing long-term people-to-people links with Russia despite the closure.

Russia has complained that Britain has failed to provide any evidence of its involvement in the Salisbury attack and has said it is shocked and bemused by the allegations.

Britain has escalated a war of words with Russia over the incident in recent days. On Friday, British Foreign Secretary Boris Johnson said it was overwhelmingly likely that Russian President Vladimir Putin himself had made the decision to use a military-grade nerve toxin to strike down Skripal.

Britain, the United States, Germany and France have jointly called on Russia to explain the attack, while U.S. President Donald Trump has said it looks as if the Russians were behind it.

Russia has said is open to cooperation with Britain, but has refused Britain’s demands to explain how Novichok, a nerve agent developed by the Soviet military, was used against the Skripals.

Skripal, a former colonel in the GRU who betrayed dozens of Russian agents to British intelligence, and his daughter have been critically ill since March 4, when they were found unconscious on a bench.

A British policeman was also poisoned when he went to help them and remains in a serious but stable condition.

Russian investigators said on Friday they had opened a criminal investigation into the attempted murder of Yulia Skripal and offered to cooperate with British authorities.

Russia offered some cooperation to British authorities after the 2006 London murder of ex-KGB agent Alexander Litvinenko too.

Britain said the assistance in that case was not enough, and in 2016, a judge-led inquiry concluded that Putin had probably approved Litvinenko’s murder, something Moscow denies</s>MOSCOW (AP) — Russia on Saturday announced it is expelling 23 British diplomats and threatened further measures in retaliation in a growing diplomatic dispute over a nerve agent attack on a former spy in Britain.

The Russian Foreign Ministry also said in a statement that it is ordering the closure of the British Council, a government organization for cultural and scientific cooperation, and that it is ending an agreement to reopen the British consulate in St. Petersburg.

It ordered the diplomats to leave within a week.

The announcement followed on the heels of Britain’s order this week for 23 Russian diplomats to leave the U.K. because Russia was not cooperating in the case of Sergei Skripal and his daughter, both found March 4 poisoned by a nerve agent that British officials say was developed in Russia. The Skripals remain in critical condition.

Britain’s foreign secretary accused Russian President Vladimir Putin of personally ordering the poisoning of the Skripals. Putin’s spokesman denounced the claim.

The Russian statement said the government could take further measures if Britain takes any more “unfriendly” moves toward Russia. British Ambassador Laurie Bristow was called to the Foreign Ministry Saturday morning to be informed of the moves.

“We will always do what is necessary to defend ourselves, our allies and our values against an attack of this sort, which is an attack not only on the United Kingdom, but upon the international rules-based system on which all countries, including Russia, depend for their safety and security,” Bristow told reporters after being informed of the expulsions.

“This crisis has arisen as a result of an appalling attack in the United Kingdom, the attempted murder of two people, using a chemical weapon developed in Russia and not declared by Russia at the Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons, as Russia was and is obliged to do under the Chemical Weapons Convention,” he added.

“It is possible that (Britain) will continue to respond; we are ready for this. But London must understand that this will not do anything, it is useless to talk with Russia with such methods,” Dzhabarov was quoted as saying by the state news agency RIA Novosti.

While Russia has vigorously denied involvement in the attack, Western powers see it as the latest sign of alleged Russian meddling abroad. The tensions threaten to overshadow Putin’s expected re-election Sunday for another six-year presidential term.

Meanwhile, new tensions have surfaced over the death this week of a London-based Russian businessman, Nikolai Glushkov. British police said Friday that he died from compression to the neck and opened a murder investigation.

Russia also suspects foul play in Glushkov’s death and opened its own inquiry Friday.

British police said there is no apparent link between the attack on Glushkov and the poisoning of the Skripals, but both have raised alarm in the West at a time when Russia is increasingly assertive on the global stage and facing investigations over alleged interference in the Donald Trump’s election as U.S. president.

The source of the nerve agent — which Britain says is Soviet-made Novichok — is unclear, as is the way it was administered. Russia has demanded that Britain share samples collected by investigators.

Top EU diplomats were expected to discuss next steps at a meeting Monday, with some calling for a boycott of the upcoming World Cup in Russia. British Prime Minister Theresa May is seeking a global coalition of countries to punish Moscow.</s>MOSCOW — Russia's Foreign Ministry has summoned the British ambassador to Russia for talks in a heightening dispute over a nerve agent attack on a former spy in Britain.

Russia is expected to announce the expulsion of some British diplomats in a retaliatory measure. British Prime Minister Theresa May this week ordered 23 Russian diplomats expelled as part of measures to punish Russia over the March 4 poisoning of former spy Sergei Skripal and his daughter Yulia in the city of Salisbury.

British Ambassador Laurie Bristow is expected at the Russian Foreign Ministry late Saturday morning.

Britain's foreign secretary accused Russian President Vladimir Putin of personally ordering the poisoning. Putin's spokesman denounced the claim.
In response to the UK's decision to expel 23 Russian diplomats following the poisoning of Sergei and Yulia Skripal, the Russian Federation expels 23 British diplomats, closes the British Council in Russia and closes the Consulate-General of the United Kingdom in Saint Petersburg.