Dozens of Russian Diplomats Expelled Across Globe

More than 130 Russian diplomats have been ordered to leave capital cities across the globe, as the West unites behind Britain over the Salisbury nerve agent attack.

Some 60 Russians are to be expelled from the US, while suspected intelligence officers in Canada, Ukraine, Australia, Albania, Macedonia and a number of EU states will also be ejected.

Forty-eight of those being kicked out of the US are attached to Russian diplomatic missions and the other 12 are accredited to the United Nations in New York.

The US has also announced that the Russian consulate in Seattle will close, due to its proximity to a submarine base and a Boeing aerospace plant.

The expulsions are part of a co-ordinated international response to the poisoning of ex-Soviet double agent Sergei Skripal and his daughter Yulia, which has been blamed on Russia.

Moscow has denied a role in the attack and its UN ambassador, Vasily Nebenzia, told reporters on Monday that the consulate closure and expulsions were "a very unfortunate, very unfriendly move".

Meanwhile, Russia's foreign ministry warned: "This provocative gesture of notorious solidarity with London, made by countries that preferred to follow in London's footsteps without bothering to look into other circumstances of the incident, merely continues the policy of escalating the confrontation."

On Twitter, the Russian Embassy in Washington DC asked followers to vote on which US consulate should be closed, listing Vladivostok, St Petersburg and Yekaterinburg as options.

British Prime Minister Theresa May said more than 100 Russians had been expelled from various countries, in what she described as the "largest collective expulsion of Russian intelligence...