Attack on ex-Russian spy threatens 21 others

Three treated for nerve agent exposure

LONDON — About 21 people have received medical treatment after a nerve-agent attack on an ex-Russian spy, British police said Thursday, as the U.K. vowed strong action against whoever was responsible for the “brazen and reckless” act.

Three people remain hospitalized after the poisoning Sunday in the southern English city of Salisbury — former spy Sergei Skripal, his daughter and a British police officer who tried to help them.

Health authorities say there is little risk to the wider public. But Wiltshire County acting police chief Kier Pritchard said “around 21 people” have had treatment, including the Skripals, who were found unconscious on a bench.

Pritchard said “a number” of the 21 were having “blood-tests, support and advice.” Previously, authorities had said only that “several” people had sought treatment.

The ex-spy and his daughter remain in critical condition in a Salisbury hospital. A police officer who came to their aid, Sgt. Nick Bailey, is hospitalized in a serious condition, though he is conscious and talking, officials said.

British Home Secretary Amber Rudd said enormous resources are being devoted to determining who poisoned Skripal, 66, and his 33-year-old daughter Yulia.

They were found unconscious on a bench, triggering a police inquiry headed by counterterrorism detectives.

“The use of a nerve agent on British soil is a brazen and reckless act,” Rudd told Parliament. “This was attempted murder in the most cruel and public way.”

Rudd said Britain would respond strongly when it is clear who is to blame.

The Russian Embassy in London, which has mocked other British politicians for suggesting Russian involvement, tweeted that it agreed with Rudd: “First evidence then conclusions on Mr. Skripal’s case. Responsible political approach.”

Police have refused to publicly speculate on who is behind the attack.

But many experts have focused on Russia because of the similarity to the 2006 killing of another former Russian spy who was poisoned in London with radioactive polonium-210.

“Russia does seem like the most likely story, given what we know both of the background of this case … given the track record in the state of the relationship, the fact that we have seen things like this before,” Sam Greene, director of the Russia Institute at King’s College London, told Sky News.

But Greene said that even if the attack was planned in Russia, it may not have been ordered by the Kremlin.

“A lot of these things are being done by people operating at sort of an arm’s length’s distance from the command and control structure,” Greene said.