British PM says “highly likely” Russia was behind nerve-agent attack

 saying.

Even before May’s comments, the Kremlin had strongly denied any notion of involvement, asserting that anti-Russian hysteria is being whipped up by the British media.

President Vladimir Putin, speaking just hours before the British meeting, said officials in the United Kingdom should first figure out what exactly occurred in Salisbury before blaming Russia for the incident.

“Get to the bottom of things over there first, and after that, then we can discuss it,” he told a BBC journalist in response to a question about Skripal during a tour of a greenhouse at the National Grain Center in the Krasnodar region.

Earlier in the day, Putin’s spokesman Dmitry Peskov told reporters that, since Skripal worked for British intelligence and was poisoned on British soil, the incident had “nothing to do with Russia, let alone the Russian leadership.”

“The odds that #Russia’s govt lost control of #Novichok stocks and this was used by some murderous mavericks to go after #Skripal are minimal,” Russia analyst Mark Galeotti said on Twitter.

Skripal, a retired Russian military intelligence colonel, was convicted by a Moscow military court in 2006 of “high treason” for passing secrets to Britain’s Secret Intelligence Service. He was one of four Russian prisoners released in 2010 in exchange for 10 Russian sleeper agents detained in the United States.

England’s chief medical officer said during the weekend that traces of the nerve agent used to poison Skripal and his daughter had been found in a pub and a restaurant the two visited before falling ill.

Sally Davies, the chief medical officer, on March 11 urged an estimated 500 people who may have come into some contact with the substance to wash their clothes as a precaution and clean items such as mobile phones, handbags, and eyeglasses.

“There has been some trace contamination by the nerve agent,” Davies said. “I am confident this has not harmed the health of anyone who was in The Mill pub or Zizzi’s [restaurant].”

Trace amounts of the substance were found on and around a table where the pair had eaten in the restaurant, the BBC reported.

Foreign Secretary Boris Johnson has said that Britain might step up sanctions against Russia if it finds that Moscow was involved.

Home Secretary Amber Rudd said on 10 March that it was still “too early” to say who was behind the poisoning.

She has said police were examining more than 200 pieces of evidence, had identified more than 240 witnesses, and were looking through security camera footage.

This article is published courtesy of Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty