UPDATED: British Prosecutors: 2 Russian Nationals Identified as Novichok Suspects.

[Mr K]

Originally Posted by 1andrew1

Good news. Wonder what made the US come round?

Mid term elections and a bad reaction to Trumps continuing 'love in' with Putin?

Latest from White House: U.S strongly condemns Russia’s use of Chemical Weapons on U.K soil and says the Nerve Agent Attack against Sergei and Yulia Skripal is a “Reckless display of contempt for the universally held norm against chemical weapons.”

[richard s]

Took their time me thinks.

Originally Posted by richard s

Took their time me thinks.

Under the Chemical and Biological Weapons Control and Warfare Elimination Act of 1991, the United States is required to impose sanctions on any foreign power determined to have used chemical or biological weapons in violation of international law within 60 days of assigning blame to the country in question.

https://www.theatlantic.com/internat...attack/567119/

BREAKING: Police issue European Arrest Warrants for TWO Russian Nationals involved in the attempted assassination of the Skripal's in Salisbury.

British prosecutors say they have sufficient evidence to charge two Russian nationals over the Salisbury novichok poisonings.

They said they had enough evidence to charge Alexander Petrov and Ruslan Boshirov with the attempted murder of Sergei Skripal, Yulia Skripal and police officer Nick Bailey.

The men are also facing charges of conspiracy to murder Mr Skripal, the use and possession of novichok contrary to the Chemical Weapons Act, and causing grievous bodily harm with intent to Yulia Skripal and Mr Bailey.

It comes after the Skripals were found slumped on a park bench in March after coming into contact with the military-grade nerve agent in Salisbury.

https://news.sky.com/story/salisbury...pects-11490744

Something tells me their extradition will not be forthcoming...

[Uncle Peter]

The kip of the pair of them: About as subtle as a flying mallet.

I expect that our friends on the West side of the river know exactly what their real names are.

[Gavin78]

They won't do much about it even if they did know the names. America wont start a war with Russia and the rest are too weak to make an attempt. existing Sanctions haven't stopped Russia now so why would further ones make a difference?

Unless something has happened and Putin doesn't know about it within his own ranks well we might as well just "carry on"

What amazes me is the number of people on social media (one or two whom are friends) who think that the Russians are being demonised and someone else is guilty. When you ask who they just come out with generalities like holes in the story and it all taking so long to find the facts. They would rather think this government is guilty of subterfuge and possibly willing to endanger British lives to 'demonise' Russia.

[Stuart]

I believe the Russians did it. It does fit in with Putin's style, even if he didn't directly order it.

That said, it troubles me. It troubles me that it was so public. The two people caught were apparently experienced spies, yet they got caught on CCTV? Maybe the Skripals, being experienced spies were unusually wary of quiet out of the way places (which would be the most logical place to kill someone - no one to notice, probably no CCTV), so would only go into busy public places.

That said, the Russians did kill that guy on London Bridge a few years ago. Can't get much more public than that. Maybe they were trying to send a message to other operatives. A warning that they can still be killed?

Originally Posted by Stuart

I believe the Russians did it. It does fit in with Putin's style, even if he didn't directly order it.

That said, it troubles me. It troubles me that it was so public. The two people caught were apparently experienced spies, yet they got caught on CCTV? Maybe the Skripals, being experienced spies were unusually wary of quiet out of the way places (which would be the most logical place to kill someone - no one to notice, probably no CCTV), so would only go into busy public places.

That said, the Russians did kill that guy on London Bridge a few years ago. Can't get much more public than that. Maybe they were trying to send a message to other operatives. A warning that they can still be killed?

They used a nerve agent that could only have come from a Russian government laboratory, and two well known military intelligence operatives rather than a ‘clean skin’ attacker. They had no intention of hiding their involvement here. Their only concession to op-sec was the false passports, but this will simply to have been to avoid the risk of a flag going up at immigration and preventing the operation from going ahead. Once it was done, they didn’t care if Five worked it out, in fact they would have been quite certain that they would.

I would say that Putin firstly wanted Russians everywhere to know that there’s nowhere he can’t get to them. Secondly he wanted to stress-test Western resolve. Exactly how far would we go in retaliation, and who would go with us?

Naming the “suspects” today is theatre for public consumption. They’re highly unlikely ever to end up in an English court, unless they’re careless enough to get arrested somewhere in an EU country. We will never know what the British and other governments are really doing about this, because that takes place in James Bond land, or at least the real-world equivalent of it. Probably more like Nick Stone, if you’re familiar with him.

[papa smurf]

Originally Posted by Chris

They used a nerve agent that could only have come from a Russian government laboratory, and two well known military intelligence operatives rather than a ‘clean skin’ attacker. They had no intention of hiding their involvement here. Their only concession to op-sec was the false passports, but this will simply to have been to avoid the risk of a flag going up at immigration and preventing the operation from going ahead. Once it was done, they didn’t care if Five worked it out, in fact they would have been quite certain that they would.

I would say that Putin firstly wanted Russians everywhere to know that there’s nowhere he can’t get to them. Secondly he wanted to stress-test Western resolve. Exactly how far would we go in retaliation, and who would go with us?

Naming the “suspects” today is theatre for public consumption. They’re highly unlikely ever to end up in an English court, unless they’re careless enough to get arrested somewhere in an EU country. We will never know what the British and other governments are really doing about this, because that takes place in James Bond land, or at least the real-world equivalent of it. Probably more like Nick Stone, if you’re familiar with him.

We could post the Glass container and the door knob to vlad in a cardboard box .

Originally Posted by Chris

I would say that Putin firstly wanted Russians everywhere to know that there’s nowhere he can’t get to them. Secondly he wanted to stress-test Western resolve. Exactly how far would we go in retaliation, and who would go with us?

Another theory I have heard is that the Kremlin is not as disciplined as it seems on the outside and that within it there are competing factions notably the security services and rich elites. So that some of these actions could be the result of that internal warfare either with one of the sides operating by themselve and/or Putin seeking the quell internal threats.

[Gavin78]

Russian wanted over novichok poisoning 'to break silence'

A Russian man wanted by the UK over the novichok poisoning of the Skripals says he will comment on the case next week.

Russian state TV made the announcement, but did not specify which of the two men identified as suspects would speak.

Hours before, Vladimir Putin said Russia has found the pair and they are "civilians" with no links to the government.

https://news.sky.com/story/man-wante...lence-11495940

[Stuart]

Originally Posted by Gavin78

Russian wanted over novichok poisoning 'to break silence'

A Russian man wanted by the UK over the novichok poisoning of the Skripals says he will comment on the case next week.

Russian state TV made the announcement, but did not specify which of the two men identified as suspects would speak.

Hours before, Vladimir Putin said Russia has found the pair and they are "civilians" with no links to the government.

https://news.sky.com/story/man-wante...lence-11495940

In fairness to Putin, he is probably right, to an extent. Assuming he has full control (see above video), the security services may not want any evidence linking Putin with potentially illegal activities. As such, these men may actually appear, to all intents and purposes, to be innocent, relatively minor employees in a totally unrelated organisation. They've also doubtless gone out of their way to ensure that any orders given can not be traced back to Putin, even if he actually told someone to poison the Skripals.

If he has lost control of the Security services, someone really wants to make him look bad. That someone could be good for the west, or they could be far worse than he is.