Russian officials in Britain pack up ahead of expulsion deadline

Several dozen people, including children, emerged from Russia's west London embassy on Tuesday morning, carrying suitcases, bags and pet carriers. Some hugged before they boarded vehicles including a white minibus and were driven away.

The Russian Foreign Ministry confirmed to The Associated Press that the 23 diplomats were expected to leave British territory Tuesday, their expulsion coming after a former Russian spy and his daughter were subjected to a nerve agent attack on U.K. soil.

Sergei Skripal and his daughter Yulia remain in critical condition following the March 4 poisoning in the English city of Salisbury.

British Prime Minister Theresa May last week gave the diplomats whom she said were undeclared intelligence agents a week to leave Britain, an order thatprompted Russia to retaliate with its own expulsion of 23 British diplomats.

Russia denies involvement in the incident, which also left a British police officer hospitalized. President Vladimir Putin's spokesman, Dmitry Peskov, insisted Tuesday that "Russia has no stocks of chemical weapons of any kind."

Asked why Russia isn't showing proof of its innocence, he said, "let's stay sober-minded and first of all wait for proof from Britain" that Russia was to blame.

Britain considering further measures

Britain's National Security Council was meeting Tuesday to consider possible further measures against Russia. May and other European Union leaders are due to discuss the poisoning at a summit Thursday. The EU on Monday condemned the poisoning and called on Russia to "address urgently" British questions over the Novichok nerve agent program.

The Russian Foreign Ministry called Britain's accusations "speculative and baseless."

Russia insists it gave up all its chemical weapons under international oversight.

The British military and police are continuing to search for clues around Salisbury into what happened. International chemical weapons experts are due to take samples of the nerve agent used, which Britain says is the Soviet-developed Novichok.

U.K. and Russia square off as diplomatic relations deteriorate

7 years ago

Duration 7:04

The U.K. and Russia are starting to square off as their diplomatic relations deteriorate. At the centre of their dispute, the poisoning of former Russian spy Sergei Skripal and his daughter in Salisbury using a Soviet-made nerve agent. In response to a lack of co-operation from Russia, British Prime Minister Theresa May has announced retaliatory measures measures Moscow is calling a serious provocation and absolutely unacceptable

British police investigators say it may take months to complete the widening inquiry. The focus is on the movement of the Skripals in the hours before they were found unconscious on a bench in the cathedral city 145 kilometres southwest of London. A police officer who came to their assistance is in serious condition.

"This is going to be frustrating for people," said Neil Basu, head of counterterrorism at the Metropolitan Police. "It is going to take weeks, possibly months to do this."

Despite the diplomatic tensions, the Russian Interior Ministry said it will continue cooperating with British authorities on security issues.

Igor Zubov, a deputy minister, told Interfax that the Skripal case "won't change anything for us at all."

A week after the Skripal poisonings, London-based Russian businessman Nikolai Glushkov was found dead at his home.

Glushkov, 68, was an associate of Boris Berezovsky, a Russian oligarch and strong Kremlin critic who died under disputed circumstances in 2013.

British police have said there is evidence Glushkov died from compression of the neck and are treating it as a homicide, but have stressed they've found no link to the Salisbury incident.