Spy Poisoning: U.S, 14 European Countries Expel Russian Diplomats

US President Donald Trump has ordered 60 Russian diplomats to leave the country in response to a nerve agent attack on an ex-spy in the English city of Salisbury.

The AFP reports that 48 “known intelligence officers” at the Russian consulate in Seattle and 12 more at the Russian mission to the UN have been given seven days to leave the United States.

The Russian consulate in Seattle will also be closed.

In a statement Monday morning, the White House said these “actions make the United States safer by reducing Russia’s ability to spy on Americans and to conduct covert operations that threaten America’s national security.”

Germany, France, Ukraine and various other European countries have also expelled Russian diplomats from their respective countries, EU President Donald Tusk said Monday.

EU leaders agreed last week it was highly likely Russia was behind the nerve-agent poisoning.

“As a direct follow-up to last week’s European Council decision to react to Russia within a common framework, already today 14 member states have decided to expel Russian diplomats,” Tusk told a news conference in Varna, Bulgaria.

Kremlin has maintained it had no role in the attack on ex-spy Sergei Skripal and his daughter, indicating it will respond “proportionately”.

Skripal and his daughter remain in a critical but stable condition in hospital in the UK.