Moscow - Russia's Foreign Ministry summoned the US charge d'affaires yesterday to demand an explanation of reports that intelligence services had dug a tunnel under the Soviet embassy in Washington in the 1980s.
Russia's demand for clarification of US press reports of the tunnel, said to have been built at the height of the Cold War, added to a growing list of irritants in spy scandals jolting relations between Washington and Moscow.
The US reports said the plan to dig the tunnel to monitor communications in the embassy had been betrayed by the FBI agent, Mr Robert Hanssen, arrested last month on charges of spying for the Soviet Union and Russia.