Lab UK defense acknowledged Tuesday he was not tracked down the source of the nerve gas that poisoned Russian ex-spy’s statement, the Kremlin said, proved that British allegations of involvement of Moscow was groundless.
Porton scientists in the UK have fallen laboratory previously identified the poison as the Soviet-developed Type of nerve agent, known as Novichok. The British government says the only plausible explanation was that he came from Russia and accused Russia in the attack on former double agent and her adult daughter.
The Porton Down chief Executive officer Gary Aitkenhead said Tuesday that scientists in the laboratory “have not yet checked for a specific source, but we have provided scientific information to government, which are then used in a number of other sources to piece together the insights that they came from.”
Aitkenhead told Sky news the attack of highly toxic chemical weapons was “possible only within the capabilities of the state actor.”
At the same time, the work of the laboratory is “to provide scientific evidence indicates that a particular substance nerve … but that’s not our job to say where it was actually made,” he said.
Russian President Vladimir Putin said in a statement Aitkenhead as proof that British accusations of Russian involvement are unfounded. Moscow vehemently denied that the attack on 4 March.
“The speed with which anti-Russian campaign is causing bewilderment,” Putin said from Turkey, where he met with President Recep Tayyip Erdogan.
Putin added that Russia will insist on a thorough investigation and hoped that the international chemical weapons Watchdog to examine the contribution of Russia.
“We want to conduct a thorough investigation. We would like to take part in it and to expect to receive all relevant materials,” – said Putin. He insisted nerve gas, which Britain says was used to attack former double agent Sergei Skripal and his daughter, Julia, may have been produced around 20 Nations.
Putin’s press Secretary Dmitry Peskov said that Moscow is waiting for an apology.
From poisoning Skripal in Salisbury, England has caused a crisis in relations between Russia and the West, producing a wave of diplomatic expulsions unprecedented even at the height of the cold war.
The UK, along with the United States and at least two dozen other British allies, wanting to show solidarity, expelled more than 150 Russian diplomats. Russia has ordered the same number of envoys from.
The British government insists that some of the information that contributed to the conclusion that the Russian government was responsible for the attack with nerve gas, including exploration, Russia has prepared a “newcomer” in the last decade has been investigated and methods of delivering nerve agents to murder.
Moscow has rejected these allegations, stating that they never produced agent dubbed the “rookie” in the West and finished in the past year, the destruction of Soviet-era chemical weapons stockpiles under international control.
Russian officials also suggested that the poison could have come from the UK, indicating that the Porton Down conducts secret research on chemical and biological weapons.
Deputy Minister of foreign Affairs of Russia Alexander Grushko has called the poisonings “a provocation arranged by the England” to justify high military spending because “they need the main enemy”.
Aitkenhead said there was “no way” the nerve agent could come from the object with a high level of security.
“We are dealing with some very toxic substances as part of the work that we do. We have the highest level of security and control,” he said.
Skripal, 66, a former Russian special services officer convicted of spying for the UK, remains in a critical condition. British officials say 33-year-old daughter’s health improves.
At the request of Russia, the organization for the prohibition of chemical weapons plans to hold an emergency session on the matter Wednesday at its headquarters in the Hague.
Yury Filatov, the Russian Ambassador to Ireland, said that Russia wants Britain “to have every item of evidence they could have in their hands” about the attack.
If Britain does not show evidence to substantiate his allegation that Moscow initiated the attack, “there are reasonable grounds to believe that we are dealing with large-scale provocation organized in London aimed to discredit Russia.”
The UK foreign office said that Moscow requested the meeting, the OPCW was “a distraction designed to undermine the work of the OPCW in reaching a conclusion” about the attack with nerve gas.
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The Isachenkov reported from Moscow. RAF Casert in Brussels and in Moscow, Nataliya Vasilyeva contributed to this story.
Sourse: abcnews.go.com
