UK denounces ‘malicious and baseless accusations’ after FSB says it ‘identified signs of intelligence and subversive work’ carried out by the officials.
Russia has accused two British diplomats of spying and ordered them to leave the country within two weeks, the latest in a series of tit-for-tat expulsions over alleged espionage.
The Russian Federal Security Service (FSB) said on Monday the Ministry of Foreign Affairs had revoked the accreditation of the diplomats, accusing them of providing false information when obtaining permission to enter Russia.
The counterintelligence agency further said it had “identified signs of intelligence and subversive work” that the two personnel had carried out, harming Russian security.
The announcement came as diplomatic relations between Russia and the United Kingdom continue to deteriorate in the wake of the former’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine in February 2022.
On Friday, a jury in London convicted three Bulgarian nationals based in the UK for carrying out “industrial-scale” spying for Russia.
Last week, a Russian court also sentenced to 19 years in prison a British man captured while fighting for Ukraine in Russia’s Kursk region.
And in early February, the UK said it would revoke the accreditation of a Russian diplomat, in retaliation to a similar move made by Russia in November last year.
The FSB did not identify the two diplomats by name, but said they were the British embassy’s second secretary and the husband of the first secretary, who came to the country “under the cover of the national embassy”.
The Russian Foreign Ministry also summoned a British embassy representative in connection with the allegations.
In a statement, a UK Foreign Office spokesperson denounced Russia’s latest expulsion and accusations of spying.
“This is not the first time that Russia has made malicious and baseless accusations against our staff,” the spokesperson said.
Intelligence scandals throughout Russian President Vladimir Putin’s quarter-century in power have strained diplomatic ties between Russia and the UK.
In 2006, the UK had accused Moscow of being behind the assassination of former Russian agent and Kremlin critic Alexander Litvinenko in a London poisoning attack.
And in 2018, the UK and its allies expelled dozens of Russian embassy officials they said were spies over the attempted poisoning of former double agent, Sergei Skripal, with Soviet-era nerve agent Novichok.
Russia has denied any involvement.