Russia recalled its ambassador to the US, a major snub, after Biden said he believed Putin is a 'killer'

• Russia recalled its ambassador to Washington, DC, for urgent talks about US-Russia relations.
• Biden has taken a tough line on Russia, angering it by assessing Putin as a "killer" in an interview.
• The US has sanctioned Russia over its treatment of Alexei Navalny and its election interference.

Russia recalled its US ambassador from Washington, DC, after President Joe Biden said in a TV interview that he believed President Vladimir Putin was a "killer."

Asking an ambassador to leave is a diplomatic snub meant to express annoyance with the host country.

A statement on Wednesday from Russia's foreign ministry did not explicitly refer to Biden or his comments but said the ambassador, Anatoly Antonov, was coming back to prevent "an irreversible deterioration in relations."

In an interview that aired Wednesday, Biden told ABC News' George Stephanopoulos that he agreed Putin is a "killer" and that Russia would "pay a price" for attempting to meddle in the 2020 US election. He also described Putin as having no soul.

Russia is expected to release a formal reaction to Biden's interview on Thursday, Reuters reported.

A report from the National Intelligence Council published on Tuesday found that Russia had attempted to push "misleading and unsubstantiated" lines about Biden to close associates of President Donald Trump.

The report also said that Russia "laundered" anti-Biden and conspiratorial narratives through some elements of US media.

Soon after the ABC News interview, Russia took the highly unusual step of removing Antonov for what its foreign ministry's statement described as "consultations in order to analyse what needs to be done in the context of relations with the United States."

Biden's interview went down badly in Moscow. Artur Chilingarov, a pro-Putin lawmaker, called for a "tough reaction," Reuters reported, while Dmitry Peskov, Putin's press secretary, called it a "very bad comment."

Konstantin Kosachev, the deputy chairman of the Russian Parliament's upper house, demanded an apology from Biden, Reuters reported.

Meanwhile, Western nations have condemned Russia's imprisonment of the dissident Alexei Navalny in January. The US intelligence community has said it has "high confidence" that Russia was behind the politician's poisoning last year. The US has called on Russia to release him, and it imposed sanctions earlier this month.

Asked about Russia's diplomatic snub on Wednesday, Jen Psaki, the White House press secretary, said the Biden administration would "take a different approach in our relationship to Russia than the prior administration," a reference to Trump's largely uncritical stance on Putin.

"We are going to be straightforward," Psaki said, "and we are going to be direct in areas where we have concerns."