Russian diplomats expelled by the US after a nerve agent attack on a former spy in Britain on Saturday afternoon began to leave their embassy in Washington, waved off by well-wishers.
About 50 men, women and children left the hilltop embassy just after 1pm in a blue bus believed to be headed toward Dulles International Airport.
Music played and a crowd waved the group goodbye.
Photo: AFP
A second left about two hours later from the embassy site, which has a view across to the White House, the Pentagon and other US government buildings.
The departing families brought with them bags and suitcases, some of which were loaded onto the bus with help from a small forklift vehicle.
Russian Ambassador to the US Anatoly Antonov earlier told reporters that “all the diplomats who were declared persona non grata are flying home together with their families.”
In total, 171 people would leave the US, Russian state news agency TASS quoted Antonov as saying.
The Russian government provided two planes for the evacuation and one of them would make a brief stopover in New York to collect 14 families, he added.
The first plane carrying Russian diplomats yesterday arrived at Moscow’s Vnukovo airport.
The Ilyushin Il-96 jet brought home 46 Russian diplomats and their family members, TASS said.
Russian television showed passengers disembarking from the plane while several buses waited to pick them up.
A second plane was expected to arrive in the Russian capital later yesterday.
Washington last week joined a score of Britain’s allies in expelling Russian diplomats in response to the attack, with more than 150 in total ordered out of the US, EU members, NATO countries and other nations.
The US said it was expelling 60 alleged Russian “spies” posted around the country and at the Russian mission to the UN.
Russia’s consulate in Seattle is also to be closed.
Moscow on Thursday responded by announcing that it was expelling 60 US diplomats and closing Washington’s consulate in St Petersburg.
On Friday, Russia expelled even more diplomats from 23 countries, most of them EU member states.
The tit-for-tat measures were retaliation to the coordinated expulsion of Russian diplomats by Britain and its allies over a nerve agent attack against former double agent Sergei Skripal and his daughter, Yulia, in the English city of Salisbury on March 4.
Britain has said it is “highly likely” that Russia was responsible for the attack using the Novichok nerve agent developed in the former Soviet Union, but Russia has denied any involvement.
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