MOSCOW, January 24. /TASS/. Russia will respond severely to the hostile steps of the Latvian authorities who decided to downgrade diplomatic relations with Moscow, the Russian Foreign Ministry said in a statement on Tuesday.

"Such an example of further unfriendly steps from Riga is not surprising. They are the logical outcome of the Latvian ruling clique’s policy aimed at consistently destroying bilateral relations. The authorities clearly don’t care about the consequences that it will have for the country and its people. We certainly will give a harsh response to any hostile actions like that," the statement reads.

"The decision clearly materialized in Riga much earlier, while the arguments that Latvia provided this time are inconsistent and contrived," the Russian Foreign Ministry noted.

On Monday, the Latvian Foreign Ministry summoned Russian Ambassador Mikhail Vanin to inform him of the Latvian authorities’ decision to downgrade diplomatic relations with Russia starting on February 24. The country’s authorities said that they had taken the move both due to the Ukrainian crisis and as a gesture of solidarity with Estonia and Lithuania.

Earlier, the Russian Foreign Ministry issued a statement saying that Moscow was downgrading diplomatic ties with Estonia in response to a significant reduction in the number of Russian embassy personnel in Tallinn and amid an overall deterioration of relations. The Estonian ambassador was ordered to leave Moscow by February 7.