MI5 links Russia to Skripal attack
BRITAIN: The suspected poisoning of a former Kremlin double agent and his daughter is being treated as an assassination attempt linked to Russia, Whitehall sources said yesterday.
Sergei Skripal, 66, and his daughter Yulia, 33, remained critically ill in hospital after being exposed to an unknown substance and collapsing at a shopping centre in Salisbury, southwest England, on Monday.
Counterterrorism detectives from Scotland Yard have taken over the inquiry from Wiltshire police and Amber Rudd, the home secretary, will chair a meeting of the Cobra crisis committee today.
Sources said that early indications pointed to a state-sponsored assassination attempt and it was being treated as such by police and MI5, the domestic security service.
Alternative theories such as a rival faction wanting to frame Russia and undermine President Vladimir Putin’s regime, or a personal dispute - have not been ruled out.
The Times has also been told that the deaths of Skripal’s wife from cancer in 2012, and his son, 44, last year in St Petersburg, will be considered as part of the Metropolitan Police investigation.
The developments increased pressure on Prime Minister Theresa May to be ready to take on Putin. As home secretary she was accused of being insufficiently robust over the poisoning of Alexander Litvinenko in London.
A senior Whitehall source said that the prime minister could have a big call to make on ‘‘whether we stand up to Russia over it or just do nothing and look weak’’.
Skripal, a former colonel in Russian military intelligence, was jailed for treason in his home country for passing secrets to MI6 but in 2010 gained refuge in the UK as part of a spy swap deal.
He and his daughter, who was visiting from Moscow, were found unconscious on a bench at the Maltings shopping centre.
Up to 10 emergency services personnel and members of the public were taken ill in the incident, with one remaining in hospital.
Firefighters in protective suits were at an ambulance base in Amesbury, Wiltshire, yesterday, where the vehicle that took the pair to hospital is thought to have been driven.
If Russia is confirmed to be behind the attack, it would be the first known case of the Kremlin trying to kill an agent after a spy swap.
It could also be the first time that Moscow has harmed the child of a target since the son of Leon Trotsky was murdered in 1937 under Stalin’s great purge.
Experts at Porton Down, the government science facility, are understood to have ruled out radioactive substances and there is speculation that a chemical such as an opiate could have been used.
Boris Johnson, the foreign secretary, vowed that Britain would respond ‘‘robustly’’ if evidence of state responsibility emerged. He acknowledged in the House of Commons that the ‘‘disturbing’’ incident had echoes of Litvinenko’s death.
‘‘While it would be wrong to prejudge the investigation, I can reassure the House that should evidence emerge that implies state responsibility, then Her Majesty’s government will respond appropriately and robustly,’’ Johnson said.
If the incident is confirmed as a state-sponsored attack, ministers will come under pressure as a first step to accept the so-called Magnitsky Amendment that allows for the British assets of human rights violators to be frozen. -