Forty-six US diplomats ordered out of Russia in reprisal for Washington's expulsion of Russian diplomats were to have left by midnight Saturday.
Four other US diplomats declared persona non grata -- the customary term for spies -- left in April.
Last week a US embassy official told AFP that many of the 46 had already left and that all the rest would be out of the country by July 1.
There was no-one available at the US embassy to confirm that all the diplomats had already left Saturday.
The deadline was set last March when Russia responded in kind to Washington's expulsion of four Russian diplomats in connection with the arrest of FBI agent Robert Hanssen, charged with spying for Russia.
46 other Russians were told to leave the United States by July 1.
Around 500 staff, among them 325 diplomats, work at the various US missions in Russia, including the Moscow embassy and consular offices in Saint Petersburg, Vladivostok and Yekaterinburg.
A summit meeting between the Russian and US presidents, Vladimir Putin and George W. Bush, in Ljubljana earlier this month had appeared to herald a warming of relations, but a US official last week said the summit had made no impact on the spy row – MOSCOW (AFP)
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