Russia Spied on Skripal and Daughter for At Least Five Years – UK

Russia’s intelligence agencies spied on former double agent Sergei Skripal and his daughter Yulia for at least five years before they were attacked with a nerve agent in March, Reuters reported the national security adviser to Britain’s prime minister as saying.

Mark Sedwill said in a letter to NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg on Friday that email accounts of Yulia had been targeted in 2013 by cyber specialists from Russia’s GRU military intelligence service.

Yulia Skripal has, meanwhile, been discharged from a hospital in the English city of Salisbury on Monday, where, she said, she was treated “with obvious clinical expertise and with such kindness” while her father remains at the hospital. She was taken to a location which has not been made public.

Skripal said she was not yet strong enough to give a media interview and she said a cousin who had spoken to Russian media did not speak for her or for her father.

Meanwhile, the lethal poison that struck down Skripal and her father have been confirmed to be a highly pure Novichok nerve agent, Reuters reported the global chemical weapons watchdog as confirming on Thursday, backing UK’s findings.

Testing by four laboratories affiliated with the global chemical weapons watchdog confirmed Britain’s findings and showed that the toxic chemical was “of high purity”.