U.K. expels 23 Russian diplomats over spy poisoning

Britain will expel nearly two dozen Russian diplomats, sever high-level bilateral contacts with Moscow and take both open and covert action against Kremlin meddling after the poisoning of a former spy, the prime minister said Wednesday, plunging U.K.-Russian relations into their deepest freeze since the Cold War.

Prime Minister Theresa May told lawmakers that 23 Russian diplomats who have been identified as undeclared intelligence officers have a week to leave the country.

May spoke after Moscow ignored a midnight deadline to explain how a nerve agent developed by the Soviet Union was used against Sergei Skripal, an ex-Russian agent convicted of spying for Britain, and his daughter Yulia. They remain in critical condition in a hospital in Salisbury, southwestern England, after being found unconscious on March 4.

May said Russia had provided no explanation, and “there is no alternative conclusion other than that the Russian state was culpable for the attempted murder of Mr. Skripal and his daughter.”

She announced a range of economic and diplomatic measures, including the suspension of highlevel contacts with Russia. An invitation for Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov to visit Britain has been cancelled, and May said British ministers and royals won’t attend the soccer World Cup in Russia this summer.

May also said Britain would clamp down on murky Russian money and strengthen its powers to impose sanctions on abusers of human rights - though she gave few details.

“We will freeze Russian state assets wherever we have the evidence that they may be used to threaten the life or property of U.K. nationals or residents,” May said, promising to use all possible legal powers against criminals and corrupt elites.

“There is no place for these people — or their money — in our country,” she said.

May vowed to use law-enforcement and intelligence powers to disrupt Russian spying and “threats of hostile state activity.” She said some of the measures “cannot be shared publicly for reasons of national security.”

The Russian Embassy in London said the expulsion of diplomats was “totally unacceptable, unjustified and shortsighted.”

“All the responsibility for the deterioration of the Russia-U.K. relationship lies with the current political leadership of Britain,” it said in a statement.