Russian spies tried to break into Novichok testing lab
THE Dutch Government expelled two suspected Russian spies earlier this year after they allegedly planned to break into a Swiss laboratory where the Novichok nerve agent samples from the Salisbury poisoning were being analysed, it has emerged.
The men were arrested in The Hague as part of an operation involving British, Dutch and Swiss intelligence agencies.
Tages-anzeiger, a Swiss newspaper, reported that the men were carrying equipment that could have been used to break into the Spiez lab near Berne when they were seized.
A spokeswoman for the Swiss Federal Intelligence Service explained: “The Swiss authorities are aware of the case of Russian spies discovered in The Hague and expelled from the same place.”
She confirmed the collaboration with UK and Dutch agencies, adding: “The FIS has thus contributed to the prevention of illegal actions against a critical Swiss infrastructure.”
Following the Salisbury attack in March, the Swiss lab confirmed that Sergei Skripal and his daughter Yulia had been poisoned by military-grade Novichok.
In June, the Swiss authorities confirmed that the Spiez laboratory had been targeted by hackers, believed to be from Sandworm, a group linked to the Russian Government.
In their interview with RT, the Russian state-sponsored TV channel, the two Salisbury suspects, Alexander Petrov and Ruslan Boshirov, who claimed to work in the fitness industry, admitted they had visited Switzerland.
Petrov said: “If memory serves me well, we had just a couple of trips to Switzerland. We spent some time during the New Year holidays there. Our trips are not always businessrelated. We went to Switzerland on holiday. We did have some business trips there as well but I can’t really remember when it was.”
The Russian embassy in Switzerland called the reports about the Swiss lab “fabrications” and said it “would not qualify attempts to stir up Russophobic sentiment”.
Dmitri Peskov, the Kremlin spokesman, said the suspects’ interview showed Petrov and Boshirov had no ties to the Russian state and the Russian Government had nothing to do with the poisoning in Salisbury.