The Russian woman who was poisoned last month alongside her former spy father said she is recovering, as Moscow and London unleashed a new war of words during a bitter UN Security Council session. Britain blames Russia for the March 4 poisoning on UK soil of former double agent Sergei Skripal and his daughter Yulia with what it says was a Soviet-made military-grade nerve agent, a charge the Kremlin furiously denies. The crisis has sent relations between Russia and the West plummeting with the biggest wave of tit-for-tat expulsions of diplomats in recent memory. In the latest expulsions, some 60 US diplomats who were ordered to leave flew out of Moscow airport early Thursday. A few hours later British authorities released a statement from Yulia commenting on her recovery. "I woke up over a week ago now and am glad to say my strength is growing daily," she was quoted as saying in comments released by the police. That statement came on a day of furious rhetoric between Moscow and London at the UN Security Council. Russia unleashed a blistering war of words against Britain deflecting accusations of poisoning a former double agent in England with Moscows envoy issuing a series of denials and colourful insults. "Its some sort of theatre of the absurd. Couldnt you come up with a better fake story?" Vasily Nebenzia, told the council. "We have told our British colleagues that youre playing with fire and youll be sorry." British Ambassador Karen Pierce was on similarly fiery form. "I wont take any lectures on morality or on our responsibilities," said Pierce, "from a country that, as this council debated yesterday, has done so much to block the proper investigation of the use of chemical weapons in Syria." It was the second showdown between Russia and Britain at the world body since the March 4 attack. Yulia and her father Sergei, a former double agent, were found in a critical condition on a public bench in the English city of Salisbury last month. Yulia appears to have made more of a recovery than her father, who remains unconscious. Russian state television earlier aired an unverified recording of a phone conversation between Yulia and her cousin who lives in Moscow. In the call, a woman introducing herself as Yulia Skripal said she was expecting to be discharged from hospital soon and that her father Sergei was "fine". The hospital where the pair are being treated said in their latest update last week that Sergei remained in a critical condition.