Russia began focusing attention on the two seized compounds in the lead up to the first meeting between Mr. Putin and Mr. Trump at the Group of 20 summit meeting in Hamburg, Germany, on July 7.

Both the Kremlin and the Foreign Ministry mentioned them frequently, hinting that the diplomatic retreats were perhaps something Mr. Trump could easily deliver as a friendly gesture for the first meeting. Mr. Putin did raise the issue with the American president, according to Dmitri S. Peskov, the Kremlin spokesman.

But with Trump associates under investigation for ties with the Russians, the president is hesitant to send any signals of weakness. So it did not happen then, either. Since that meeting, the official tone has turned more belligerent, with Russia threatening to expel American diplomats to match the 35 Russian diplomatic staff members kicked out of the United States at the same time that the two compounds were seized.

On Tuesday, frustrated by the failure of a meeting the day before in Washington to make any headway on the matter, the Russian Foreign Ministry issued a blunt statement. In it, the ministry warned that “if Washington does not address this and other concerns, including persistent efforts to hinder the operation of Russia’s diplomatic missions, Russia has the right to take retaliatory measures in accordance with the principle of reciprocity.”

The deputy foreign minister, Sergei Ryabkov, told the news agency Interfax on Tuesday, “The fact that this issue hasn’t been settled actually poisons the atmosphere and makes a lot of things extremely complicated.”