U.K. points finger at Putin on nerve agent use in attack
LONDON — The U.K.’s top diplomat pointed the finger directly at Vladimir Putin on Friday, saying it was “overwhelmingly likely” that he personally ordered the nerve-agent attack on British soil.
In a rapid escalation of a diplomatic crisis between the two countries, Foreign Secretary Boris Johnson said the U.K.’s problem was not with the Russian people, but with the Russian leader.
His intervention came the same day as the Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons said it was willing to support the U.K.’s investigation into the poisoning of a Russian double agent
and his daughter, and London police said that a Russian man found dead this week had been murdered.
“Our quarrel is with Putin’s Kremlin and with his decision — and we think it overwhelmingly likely that it was his decision — to direct the use of a nerve agent on the streets of the U.K., on the streets of Europe, for the first time since World War II,” Mr. Johnsonsaid in west London.
Prime Minister Theresa May announced the expulsion of 23 Russian diplomats Wednesday in response to the poisoning of the former spy in southwest England, and Britain is waiting on the Kremlin’s response, which is expected to include tit-fortat expulsions as the two countries trade barbs over the apparent attempted murder of Sergei Skripal and his daughter Yulia.
“We have said on different levels and occasions that Russia has nothing to do with this story,” Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said in a text message responding to Mr. Johnson’s claim. “Any reference or mentioning of our President is nothing else but shocking and unpardonable diplomatic misconduct.”
The diplomatic tension increased further Friday afternoon when London’s Metropolitan Police said it is treating as murder the death of Nikolai Glushkov, a close associate of Putin opponent Boris Berezovsky — a onetime billionaire who was himself found hanging dead in 2013 in his house outsideLondon.
Mr. Glushkov, 68, was found dead at his home in the southwest of the U.K. capital on March 12. An autopsy showed he died from “compression to the neck,” the police said in a statement, adding that there was no evidence he had been poisoned or to link his death to the attack on the Skripals.
“The Met Police’s Counter Terrorism Command, which has led the investigation from the outset, is now treating Mr. Glushkov’s death as murder,” the statement said. “As a precaution, the command is retaining primacy for the investigation because of the associations Mr. Glushkov is believed to have had.”
Earlier, the Russian InvestigativeCommittee said it was also opening a criminal case into Mr. Glushkov’s death, describing it as “murder.” It will also investigate the attack on Yulia Skripal, it said in a statementon its website.
Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov accused Britain of breaching international law in its investigation of the attack on the Skripals in the city of Salisbury. Ms. May said the agent used has been identified by British scientists as Novichok, which was developed in the Soviet Union.