The Great Smoky Mountain Journal
Source:
Tuesday, January 01, 2019 02:39 PM
British UK Police: It's Likely Russia Behind Deadly Poisoning Of Ex-Russian Spy, His Daughter Last Week As Kremlin Ups It's Denials and Protest Against Accusation
Sergei Skripal and his daughter Yulia remain hospitalized in critical condition after being exposed to a military-grade nerve agent.
British Prime Minister Theresa May has vowed retaliatory measures if Russia offers no explanation for how the nerve agent developed in the Soviet Union came to poison the former spy and his daughter in a British city.
The Russian Foreign Ministry says it has summoned British Ambassador Laurie Bristow and handed him a protest note over the "baseless accusations" leveled against Russia. The ministry dismissed the reaction of British authorities to the attack as "provocative" and said it suspects the poisoning is "another unscrupulous attempt of the British authorities to discredit Russia."
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2:30 p.m.
British police say the investigation into the chemical agent attack on a former Russian spy will last many weeks, and that they are not declaring a person of interest yet in the probe.
In a brief statement outside police headquarters, new counter-terror chief Neil Basu offered more details on the movements of Sergei Skripal and his daughter Yulia before they were attacked in the English town of Salisbury on March 4. He appealed to the public to come forward if they saw the pair that day.
Basu says the public will see much police activity in and around the city over the coming days and that they should not be alarmed.
Basu also revealed for the first time that Skripal was a British citizen — a fact that might color the government's response to the incident.
