MOSCOW, March 23. /TASS/. The Russian embassy in Poland is bidding farewell to three-quarters of its staff after Warsaw decided to expel 45 Russian diplomats, Russian Ambassador to Poland Sergey Andreyev said on Rossiya-1 television on Wednesday.

"As a result, we are losing about three-quarters, if not more, of our diplomatic operational staff," he said. "This, of course, greatly undermines our ability to work normally."

Andreyev said that was an unprecedented case in his career.

"This is a logical development of our relations with Poland, which have been going downhill for a long time," he said. "Every time they ask me this: "Can it get worse?" Every time I feel like it couldn't get any worse. But this time, when we seemed to have reached rock bottom, it could."

Earlier on Wednesday, Russian Ambassador to Poland Sergey Andreyev was summoned to the country’s Foreign Ministry, where he was handed a note about the expulsion of 45 Russian diplomats on charges, according to Warsaw, of intelligence activities. The ambassador called this decision unfounded and said Russia would take retaliatory steps to expel Polish diplomats based on reciprocity.

The ambassador himself isn’t being expelled. According to Andreyev, diplomatic relations between the countries, as well as the work of the Russian embassy in the country, are going on. The diplomats on the Polish expulsion list have different deadlines for leaving the country, with the longest being a five-day deadline. Replacement of departing diplomats with new employees is not stipulated.