2nd Skripal suspect ‘to be identified’

THE true identity of the second Salisbury novichok suspect will be revealed in Parliament next week.

The Bellingcat investigative website is set to name the Russian GRU military intelligence officer at a Commons meeting hosted by Tory MP Bob Seely on Tuesday.

The two suspects in the attempted poisoning of ex-Russian spy Sergei Skripal were originally named by the Government as Ruslan Boshirov and Alexander Petrov, although it was made clear the names were aliases.

Last month, Bellingcat, working with Russian website The Insider, named Boshirov as Colonel Anatoliy Chepiga, a highly-decorated GRU officer.

Mr Seeley tweeted a link to an advertisement for the meeting, entitled “Announcement of the identity of the second Skripal suspect”, adding that the comment “looks interesting”.

The disclosure of Petrov’s true identity is likely to come as a further embarrassment for the GRU, following its failed bid to hack the computers of the global chemical weapons watchdog.

British and Dutch authorities disclosed on Thursday how a four-man GRU “close access” team was sent back to Moscow after it tried to target the headquarters of the Organisation for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW) in The Hague in April.

At the time, OPCW scientists were working to identify the deadly novichok nerve agent used in the attack on Mr Skripal and his daughter, Yulia, a month earlier.

The spy agency was widely ridiculed after it emerged the operatives had left behind them clues to their identity and details of other GRU operations.

The GRU has already faced mockery over the Russian TV appearance of Boshirov and Petrov, in which they claimed they were innocent tourists wanting to see Salisbury Cathedral.