Russia announced the tit-for-tat expulsions of four British diplomats today in an escalating row over the murder of Alexander Litvinenko.

Reacting to Britain's decision on Monday to expel four Russian envoys from the UK, the Russian foreign ministry also announced that British officials wanting to visit Russia will not be granted visas - and Russian officials will no longer be allowed to visit the UK.

Lamenting the breakdown in relations, Mikhail Kamynin, a foreign ministry spokesman, added: "To our regret, co-operation between Russia and Britain on issues of fighting terrorism becomes impossible."

Britain is demanding that Russia extradite Andrei Lugovoy, a former KGB officer, to face trial for the murder of Litvinenko, who died last November of radiation poisoning.

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BACKGROUND

• Lies and the spies: I must have justice

• Shadowy ex-KGB major takes cover

• Of course the Russians did it. They’re the experts

• The Litvinenko File

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Relations have also been badly damaged by a subsequent plot - which only came to light yesterday - to send a hitman to London to assassinate the exiled oligarch Boris Berezovsky, another prominent critic of President Putin.

Today's expulsions were first communicated to Anthony Brenton, the British Ambassador to Moscow, who was summoned to the foreign ministry. Mr Brenton refused to comment but they were later condemned by David Miliband, the Foreign Secretary, as "completely unjustified."

Mr Kamynin said that Russia has been forced into the various measures but had been careful not to target ordinary citizens, either tourists or business people, who would not be affected by the expulsions or visa ban.

He added: "The position of the Brown Government is not based on 'British commonsense', because their demand for a sovereign democratic country to bend its Constitution because of the crime of one person is unreasonable."

Tony Halpin, Moscow Correspondent of The Times, said that the tit-for-tat expulsions, the first for a decade, left Anglo-Russian relations at their lowest since the end of the Cold War.

But Halpin said that Moscow's decision to limit the expulsions to four was an indication that it wants to avoid a prolonged and damaging confrontation with Britain.

"Instead, it is hoping that relations can be quietly rebuilt in the autumn once the heat has gone out of the immediate confrontation over Mr Lugovoy," Halpin said.

British diplomats have been working hard to ensure international solidarity in their extradition battle - although Moscow reacted testily to a Portuguese message of support yesterday. Portugal currently holds the rotating presidency of the EU.

Shortly before today's expulsions were announced, the UK also won the backing yet from the United States - which has so far done its best to avoid getting dragged into the Litvinenko row - when Condoleezza Rice called on Russia to accede to the extradition request.

"A terrible crime was committed on British soil and Britain has to find the perpetrators and bring them to justice and Russia should honour the extradition request," Ms Rice told Sky News.

The Russian Constitution forbids Russia from extraditing its own citizens, but Britain insists that Moscow could hand over Mr Lugovoy under the terms of an international convention it has signed.

Sergei Lavrov, the Russian Foreign Minister, is due to meet his German counterpart, Walter Steinmeier, in Berlin tomorrow to discuss the diplomatic row.

A German foreign ministry spokesman, Martin Jaeger, said the meeting would involve "brief but intensive talks". Mr Steinmeier said yesterday that he hoped the row would not be allowed to escalate in to "a crisis".

Meanwhile, Russia’s ambassador to Britain, Yuri Fedotov, rejected an assertion in a Times editorial linking Litvinenko's murder to the Kremlin.

"It is preposterous to assert that the killing of Alexander Litvinenko ’appears to have had the clear backing, if not the active assistance, of the Russian government,’" he wrote in a letter to the newspaper.

"As President Putin has made clear in his unequivocal condemnation of his killing, Mr Litvinenko's death was a heinous crime. The Russian Government has assured the UK that any evidence supplied by the Crown Prosecution Service will be used to pursue the case through the Russian courts."

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