Some 46 US diplomats who were expelled from Russia during a spy scandal in March will leave by July 1st, a US official in Moscow said yesterday.
He added: "This is all part of the old scandal" - sparked apparently by the arrest earlier this year of the FBI agent, Mr Robert Hanssen, who is charged with spying for the Soviet Union and Russia for at least 15 years. Mr Hanssen was arrested in Virginia in February.
Washington retaliated by expelling four Russian diplomats and pronouncing 46 others personae non grata. In a tit-for-tat response, Moscow also expelled four US diplomats, and promised to take further action.
Many of the 46 American diplomats had already started leaving Russia, Interfax quoted US diplomatic sources as saying.
The spy row cast a chill shadow over Russian-US relations during the early months of the new American administration under President Bush. However, optimistic observers had expressed hope after last Saturday's summit in Ljubljana that both sides would draw a line under the Bush White House's rocky start to its contacts with Russia, which have coincided with a long-running dispute over missile defence.
Washington's decision in March to expel 50 diplomats was the first large-scale blacklisting of foreign diplomats by a host country since the end of the Cold War.
In 1971, Britain expelled 105 members of the Soviet diplomatic mission's staff. France expelled 47 Soviet diplomats in 1983, while 80 diplomats posted by Moscow to the United States were expelled in 1986.
Some 500 staff, among them 325 diplomats, work at the US missions in Russia, including the Moscow embassy and consular offices in Saint Petersburg, Vladivostok and Yekaterinburg, according to the latest survey.
Meanwhile, Russia's parliament yesterday approved President Putin's plan to limit the number of political parties and provide state financing to the surviving few - a law heavily criticised by liberal forces.
The State Duma (lower house of parliament) ratified the controversial measure by 238 votes to 165, passing the Kremlin legislation on to the Federation Council (upper chamber) which is also expected to adopt the Bill.
"The country needs this law. Most of our problems are linked to the fact that we lack an effective political system," said Mr Konstantin Kosachyov of the centrist Fatherland-All Russia group.
"The political system we have now is too subjective and cannot be described as modern, whereas this law will create and oversee political parties on a truly democratic basis," he added.
Mr Putin argues that the law will make Russia's chaotic legislative system more workable and keep corrupt business barons from funding fly-by-night parties to buy them the immunity from prosecution that goes with a Duma seat.
It comes as part of a year-old Kremlin effort to consolidate political power that had slipped from Moscow control into the regions under Mr Putin's predecessor, Mr Boris Yeltsin.
Only days after taking office in March 2000, Mr Putin moved to strip regional governors of their seats in the Federation Council and created seven regional super-districts - overseen by the Kremlin - that group Russia's 89 sprawled regions.
Mr Putin's outnumbered Duma opponents argue that the Kremlin now is simply creating a political system in which Russia has a small number of centrist parties who are on cosy terms with the government.
The debate has also seen a rare - if temporary - alliance between Russian liberals and the Communist Party.