[Vergiftiging Skripal] #1 - Spanningen tussen Rusland en het Westen

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Op zondag 1 april 2018 16:11 schreef Infection het volgende:

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Dat dacht ik dus ook. En vooral als je ziet wat er vandaag weer allemaal naar buiten gekomen is, is dit nog een behoorlijk actief 'conflict'.

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Op zondag 1 april 2018 17:46 schreef Nikonlover het volgende:
En liever geen westerse propaganda bronnen.

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Op zondag 1 april 2018 17:46 schreef Nikonlover het volgende:
En liever geen westerse propaganda bronnen.

Russian State TV: Being a Traitor Jeopardizes Your Health

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Op zondag 1 april 2018 21:37 schreef Infection het volgende:

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Ik post zowel Nederlandse als Russische bronnen. Beide bevatten propaganda. Vind maar eens nieuws zonder propaganda. Succes.

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Op zondag 1 april 2018 23:31 schreef alilami het volgende:

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En dan vinden wij NOS staatspropaganda:

Russian State TV: Being a Traitor Jeopardizes Your Health

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(CNN)British authorities examining the poisoning of former Russian spy Sergei Skripal believe the daring placement of the nerve agent on his door shows a sophistication that likely had the approval of the Kremlin, a source briefed on the investigation has confirmed to CNN.

Skripal, 66, and his daughter Yulia, 33, were poisoned on March 4 after being exposed to what the British government says was a military-grade nerve agent.
British officials believe an attack of this type could only be carried out by a person (or more than one person) with key training involving Novichok, the substance used in the attack.

There are doubts that rogue agents could have carried out the attack without approval from the top levels of Russian government.
Police officers stand outside the home of former Russian spy Sergei Skripal following his alleged poisoning.

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For an assassin to leave poison on Mr. Skripal’s door handle would require considerable knowledge of the underlying chemistry, said Richard Guthrie, an independent chemical weapons expert and editor of CBW Events.

The nerve agent would have to be designed so that it would remain on the door handle, and then reliably be transferred to the target’s hand, he said.

“It’s a huge implication, if it was the door handle, because it means someone had to be in the U.K. with the material,” Mr. Guthrie said. “Anything you create that would stick to the door handle, you’ve got to make it so that it would be removed from the door handle when it was handled, and not dropped off too quickly. That’s complicated chemistry.”

The assassin, he added, would have had to possess a high confidence that his target would be affected, because, he said, “you don’t want to stand in front of the front door.”

Alastair Hay, an emeritus professor of toxicology at the University of Leeds, agreed that such an attack would require specialized knowledge, to ensure the poison adhered to the door handle but felt innocuous to the targets.

“Once they touched it, they would know that this handle was wet,” Professor Hay said. “But they would not have dreamed that someone was trying to poison them. If they had, they would try to wipe it off.”

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Porton Down experts unable to verify 'precise source of novichok'

Defence lab unable to definitively say where nerve agent that poisoned Sergei Skripal and his daughter came from

British scientists at Porton Down have not been able to establish where the novichok nerve agent used to poison Sergei and Yulia Skripal was made, it has emerged.

Gary Aitkenhead, the chief executive of the Defence Science and Technology Laboratory (DSTL) at Porton Down, Wiltshire, said it had not proved it was created in Russia.

Aitkenhead confirmed the substance required “extremely sophisticated methods to create something probably only in the capabilities of a state actor”.

The comments are bound to be seized on by Russia, which insists it was not behind the attack and claims the British government’s accusations that it is behind it are a provocation.

Speaking to Sky News, Aitkenhead said: “We were able to identify it as novichok, to identify that it was military-grade nerve agent.

“We have not identified the precise source, but we have provided the scientific information to government who have then used a number of other sources to piece together the conclusions that they have come to.”

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Op maandag 2 april 2018 20:57 schreef crystal_meth het volgende:

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https://edition.cnn.com/2(...)oval-intl/index.html
sophistication, key training? Hoeveel training heb je nodig om iets op een deurklink te strijken?
In 1994 gebruikte de Aum Shinrikyo sekte VX zenuwgif om een tegenstander te doden, hij kreeg het tijdens een wandeling in Osaka op z'n nek gesproeid. Kim Jong Un's broer werd met VX gedood door twee vrouwen die misschien niet wisten dat het gif betrof.
En het iets minder krachtige zenuwgif VG (dodelijke dosis is 10x hoger dan VX) werd midden jaren '50 in de VS verkocht als insecticide. Ik betwijfel dat de meeste boeren training kregen in het gebruik ervan.

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https://www.nytimes.com/2(...)k-spy-poisoning.html

Complicated chemistry, specialized knowledge? Hebben die experts zelf met Novichok agents gewerkt, dat ze dit weten? Andere zenuwgiffen vereisen geen gespecialiseerde kennis om ze te gebruiken. VX bvb is een olieachtige, niet-vluchtige vloeistof, je hebt geen universitair diploma nodig om te weten dat als je het aan een deurklink strijkt, een deel ervan op je hand zal achterblijven als je de klink aanraakt.

Vraag me af welke alternatieve methodes ze in gedachten hadden, als ze dit zo significant vinden. De andere hypotheses die de voorbije weken in de media verschenen (gif aangebracht in de ventilatie van de auto, in de bagage van de dochter, op een boeket bloemen bedoeld voor het graf van z'n vrouw) leken meer kennis en voorbereiding te vereisen, en moeilijker uit te voeren.
En om dit sofisticated te noemen, contactgif op een deurklink is haast een cliché, te vinden in meerdere boeken van Loompanics (uitgeverij gespecialiseerd in "onconventionele" topics, in 2006 stopgezet). Het enige dat nog ontbreekt is dimethyl sulfoxide als solvent (DMSO dringt door de huid heen, en neemt stoffen die erin opgelost zijn mee).

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Op dinsdag 3 april 2018 19:55 schreef KoosVogels het volgende:

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Was natuurlijk gewoon een uit de hand gelopen gebbetje van de achterbuurman van die kerel.

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Op dinsdag 3 april 2018 20:03 schreef crystal_meth het volgende:

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Dat men het gif had is duidelijk. Dat het aanbrengen op de deurklink gespecialiseerde kennis of training vereiste is onzin. Kijk hoe die twee die Litvinenko vergiftigden geknoeid hebben. Dat waren ook geen getrainde agents. Lijkt me dat de Russen iemand zouden gebruiken die een legitieme reden heeft om in Londen te zijn, eerder dan een getrainde geheimagent.

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Op dinsdag 3 april 2018 20:07 schreef KoosVogels het volgende:

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Persoonlijk zou ik geen idee hebben hoe ik iemand moet vergiftigen. Dus mij van de straat plukken zou weinig zin hebben.

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Op dinsdag 3 april 2018 19:53 schreef Infection het volgende:

twitter:

AP twitterde op dinsdag 03-04-2018 om 19:52:35 BREAKING: Russian President Vladimir Putin says Russia wants a thorough inquiry into ex-spy's poisoning in Britain. reageer retweet

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The Latest: Putin demands thorough nerve agent attack probe
Russian President Vladimir Putin says Moscow wants a thorough probe into the poisoning of an ex-Russian spy in Britain and will demand to be part of it.

Putin, speaking Tuesday in Ankara following talks with Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan, cited the head of Britain’s defense laboratory who said that its scientists have not identified the precise source of the nerve agent used to attack former double agent Sergei Skripal and his daughter.

Putin said, given the lack of precise information about the agent’s origin, “the speed at which the anti-Russian campaign has been launched causes bewilderment.”

Britain has blamed Russia for the poisoning, the accusations Russia vehemently denied. Both the West and Russia have expelled over 150 envoys each in the dispute.

Putin said the type of the nerve agent used in the March 4 poisoning could be made in some 20 nations.

9:40 p.m.

Russia’s envoy to the European Union says British accusations of Russian involvement in the poisoning of an ex-Russian spy could have been an attempt to distract public attention from Britain’s troubled exit from the EU.

Vladimir Chizhov said Tuesday “this distractive maneuver could have been aimed at the British society, which has remained split after the 2016 Brexit referendum.”

Britain has accused Russia of involvement in the March 4 nerve agent attack on former double agent Sergei Skripal and his daughter, the accusations Russia has vehemently denied.

Moscow alleged that British intelligence agencies could have been behind the poisoning.

Chizhov says “Russia clearly had no motive” to attack Skripal, who was convicted of spying for Britain but freed in a 2010 spy swap. He added Moscow had “no outstanding issues” against the 66-year-old Skripal.

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6:50 p.m.

France is refusing to answer a detailed list of questions from Russia over the spy poisoning scandal in Britain that has turned into a multi-country diplomatic dispute.

France expelled four Russian diplomats last week over the nerve agent attack on Sergei Skripal. Russia sent France 10 questions about why France thinks Russia was involved, and about France’s own chemical weapons programs.

A French diplomatic official said Tuesday that Britain had informed France about the details of its investigation. The official did not divulge those details, but said Russian involvement in the attack is the only “plausible explanation.”

The official told The Associated Press that France would not respond to Russia until Moscow answers questions posed by Britain’s government on March 12. Britain at the time asked the Russian ambassador to say whether the attack was carried out by the Russian state, or whether Russia lost control of the nerve agent used.

Britain says the Soviet-made nerve agent Novichok was used in the attack last month. Russia vehemently denies any responsibility.

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Skripal poisoning: deleted Foreign Office tweet leads to awkward questions

Boris Johnson under pressure to explain whether position has changed after tweet blaming Moscow is deleted

Boris Johnson is facing embarrassing questions over his claims that Russia had produced the Salisbury nerve agent after it emerged that the Foreign Office had deleted a tweet blaming Moscow for the attack.

With the foreign secretary already under pressure over his remarks two weeks ago that a Porton Down scientist had been “absolutely categorical” that the novichok had originated in the country, Jeremy Corbyn accused Johnson of “completely exceeding the information he had been given” after the emergence of the deleted tweet.

But Johnson later hit back, accusing the Labour leader of “playing Russia’s game”.

The deletion, immediately seized on by the Russian embassy, has deepened the government’s difficulties after British scientists at the UK’s defence research laboratory announced on Tuesday that they had not established that the nerve agent used to poison Sergei and Yulia Skripal had been made in Russia.

After Porton Down said it had “not identified the precise source” of the poison, the Foreign Office issued a swift rebuttal saying the prime minister had always been clear that the assessment was “only one part” of the intelligence picture.

The announcement prompted claims from the Kremlin that Britain was lying about the origins of the novichok and demanded an apology from Theresa May.

However, it emerged on Wednesday that the Foreign Office had earlier deleted a tweet claiming the British scientists had concluded that the nerve agent was “produced in Russia”.

In an awkward development for the Foreign Office, the Russian embassy’s Twitter feed pointed out that the 20 March tweet on a presentation by Britain’s ambassador to Moscow on the Salisbury attack had disappeared.

twitter:

RussianEmbassy twitterde op woensdag 04-04-2018 om 13:35:39 Why would @foreignoffice delete this tweet from 22 March? https://t.co/Nvu1BfJw9J reageer retweet

A Foreign Office spokesman said: “An HMA Moscow [British ambassador Laurie Bristow] briefing on 22 March was tweeted in real time by @UKinRussia and amplified by @foreignoffice to explain what happened in Salisbury to as wide an audience as possible.

“One of the tweets was truncated and did not accurately report our ambassador’s words. We have removed this tweet.”

According to an official transcript of the speech, Bristow’s original words were: “The analysts at Porton Down, the Defence Science and Technology Laboratory in the UK, established and made clear that this was a military-grade chemical weapon. One of the novichok series; a nerve agent as I said produced in Russia.”

Corbyn, who faced criticism for his initial, cautious response to the novichok allegations, accused Johnson of exaggerating the evidence that Russia was to blame for the Salisbury poisoning.

The Labour leader, asked on a campaign visit to Watford about the foreign secretary’s remarks, said: “He claimed categorically – and I think he used the words 101% – that it had come from Russia.

“Boris Johnson seems to have completely exceeded the information that he had been given and told the world in categorical terms what he believed had happened. And it’s not backed up by the evidence he claimed to have got from Porton Down in the first place. Boris Johnson needs to answer some questions.

He added that Johnson had been left with “egg on his face” over his interview.

In a series of tweets on Wednesday afternoon, Johnson dismissed Corbyn’s response, writing: “It is lamentable that Jeremy Corbyn is now playing Russia’s game and trying to discredit the UK over Salisbury attack... 28 other countries have been so convinced by UK case they have expelled Russians. In contrast, Jeremy Corbyn chooses to side with the Russian spin machine.”

The European commission said it had never thought that Porton Down had been tasked with identifying the source of the substance used in Salisbury.

The commission spokesman Alexander Winterstein told a Brussels press briefing: “Our understanding is that the role of the experts there was to identify the type of agent that was used, not the source of the agent ... They did identify the nerve agent novichok. That is what they have done.”

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Op woensdag 4 april 2018 18:05 schreef Infection het volgende:

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Blijkbaar is er toch niet zoveel bewijs dat het de Russen waren als ze dat ze in eerste instantie zeiden. Maar wel met z'n allen diplomaten uitzetten.

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Finland gives conditional authorization to use its economic zone for Nord Stream 2

The Government of Finland issued a conditional permit to use its exclusive economic zone for construction of the Nord Stream 2 gas pipeline, the government’s office said on Thursday.

"The decision [was made] in respect of using the exclusive economic zone of Finland to issue a conditional permit to the Nord Stream 2 gas pipeline project. The permit will be valid for 50 years and it should be renewed after that," the statement says.

This is only the first phase of issuing permits for the project, Counselor of the Finland’s Ministry of Employment and Economy Kari Klemm told TASS.

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Op woensdag 4 april 2018 21:19 schreef crystal_meth het volgende:

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Misschien heeft GCHQ of MI6 meer bewijs geleverd (afgeluisterde gesprekken, een mol), dat gaan ze niet openbaar maken want dan weten de Russen waar het lek zit. Misschien dat ze het daarom voor de publieke opinie op een andere manier proberen, oa door de indruk te wekken dat enkel Rusland het kan maken (ook al spreekt het voor zich dat de VS, UK, Frankrijk en andere landen het ook gemaakt hebben, je wil minstens weten hoe je het detecteert, of de bestaande NBC uitrusting voldoende beschermt etc..)

Niet noodzakelijk de beste aanpak, zeker als het hoofd van Porton Down niet bereid is te liegen tijdens een interview (op de vraag of ze zelf Novichok agents maakten of in bezit hadden heeft ie geen antwoord gegeven, en ook toen ie ontkende dat Porton Down iets met de vergiftiging te maken kon hebben zei ie niet dat ze geen Novichoks hadden, maar: "no way that anything like that would ever have come from us or leave the four walls of our facilities").

Het leek me dom om te claimen dat enkel Rusland het kon maken, de Russen weten dat het niet zo is, die kunnen nu vragen blijven stellen waarop de UK geen antwoord wil geven. In Duitsland hebben politici van de CSU en de SPD al kritiek geuit, Corbyn heeft z'n twijfels, Boris Johnson kan dat wel afdoen als "playing Russia’s game and trying to discredit the UK", maar als ze geen concrete bewijzen leveren gaat dat op de duur lijken op Trump's strijd tegen de "fake media"...

Ze hebben sinds het begin naar eerdere leugens van de Russen (Oekraine, Krim, Litvinenko, Syrië..) verwezen, "de Russen liegen altijd en doen het nu ook weer". Probleem is dat ze zelf ook niet zo sterk staan (zeker Boris Johnson niet, met oa z'n rol in de Brexit campagne), en met het Irak dossier nog in de herinnering...

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Op donderdag 5 april 2018 15:07 schreef nixxx het volgende:

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Het lijkt mij dat je dat spulletje op zich in een beetje respectabel universiteits organisch chemisch lab in elkaar moet kunnen zetten. Moet je wel een paar schroefjes los hebben zitten maar in een glovebox in een zuurkast zou je het kunnen proberen.

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Sources said it was believed the guinea pigs had died due to lack of water and had not been poisoned.

The decision to put down the cat was made by a veterinary surgeon in accordance with the Animal Welfare Act 2006, sources stressed last night.

They said the animals were disposed of appropriately. A government spokesperson said: 'The property in Wiltshire was sealed as part of the police investigation.

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Summary of Disinformation

Ex-head of FSB Nikolai Kovalev suspects Ukraine poisoned Skripal.

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The nerve agent has been identified as Novichok (which means newcomer in Russian). It is known to be more powerful than VX and was developed in Russia in the 1970s and 1980s. It's so unusual, that very few scientists outside of Russia have any real experience in dealing with it and no country outside of Russia is known to have developed the substance.

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Yulia Skripal's cousin Viktoria denied UK visa to visit poisoned relatives in hospital

A Home Office spokesman said: “We have refused a visitor visa application from Viktoria Skripal on the grounds that her application did not comply with the immigration rules.”

Viktoria, who lives in Russia, declared she would visit her cousin in hospital after hospital staff announced Yulia was recovering from the attack, which involved the toxic nerve agent novichock.

twitter:

SkyNewsBreak twitterde op vrijdag 06-04-2018 om 18:17:32 Victoria Skripal has told Sky News "the British must have something to hide" after the Home Office denied her application for a visitor visa reageer retweet

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Op dinsdag 3 april 2018 20:36 schreef Infection het volgende:

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De propanda-machine draait overuren deze dagen. Als je ziet wat voor beschuldigingen er heen en weer geslingerd worden elke dag, zonder enig bewijs.

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Op donderdag 5 april 2018 17:08 schreef crystal_meth het volgende:

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Iraanse onderzoekers hebben in 2016 vijf "novichok" agents bereid en de spectra (GC/MS en LC-MS/MS) ervan opgemeten. Die gegevens zijn aan de database van de OCPW toegevoegd.

De bereiding van één ervan:

Aan een oplossing van methylfosfonyldifluoride in dichloromethaan voeg je al roerend een oplossing van (CH₃)₂NC(=NH)N(CH₃)₂ (1,1,3,3‐tetramethylguanidine) en tri-ethylamine in dichloromethaan (verhouding methylfosfonyldifluoride : tetramethylguanidine : tri-ethylamine 8:12:13) toe bij een temperatuur van 0–5 °C. Na 30 minuten het reactieproduct N‐[Bis(dimethylamino)methylidene]‐P‐methylphosphonamidic fluoride eruit filteren.
https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full/10.1002/rcm.7757

Methylfosfonyldifluoride kan je bereiden door dimethylmethylfosfonaat (de stof die aan boord was van het gecrashte El Al vliegtuig in de Bijlmer) te chlorineren met thionylchloride. De volledige procedure vind je in "The Preparatory Manual of Chemical Warfare Agents. The Paranoid Publications Group, 2003, p. 164."

Als de Iraniers dat kunnen, dan kunnen anderen het ook.

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Op zaterdag 7 april 2018 12:52 schreef nixxx het volgende:

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Ik bedoel maar, zenuwgas klinkt voor de gemiddelde burger heel indrukwekkend en ze krijgen daar beelden bij van mensen die in volledige pakken aan het werk zijn.

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Medical director Dr Christine Blanshard said he has made "good progress", adding: "Although he's recovering more slowly than Yulia we hope he too will be able to leave hospital in due course."

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Rusland wantrouwt verklaring Skripal

LONDEN - Rusland zet vraagtekens bij een door de Britse politie gepubliceerde verklaring van Joelia Skripal. De dochter van voormalig dubbelspion Sergej Skripal stelde onder meer geen gebruik te willen maken van de diensten van de Russische ambassade in Londen. Ook wil ze momenteel niet met de media praten.

De diplomatieke post reageerde sceptisch op die mededelingen. „We willen graag vaststellen dat het echt gaat om een verklaring van Joelia”, reageert de ambassade. „De tekst is op een speciale manier opgesteld om officiële verklaringen van de Britse autoriteiten te ondersteunen. Tegelijkertijd wordt uitgesloten dat Joelia contact kan hebben met de buitenwereld.”

Joelia Skripal is eerder deze maand ontslagen uit het ziekenhuis en bevindt zich op een onbekende locatie. De Britse regering houdt Rusland verantwoordelijk voor aanslag met zenuwgas op de vrouw en haar vader in het Engelse Salisbury. De Russen ontkennen betrokken te zijn. De ambassade roept de Britten op met bewijs te komen dat de Russische Joelia vrij is om te gaan en staan waar ze wil.

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Worlds chemical watchdog confirms: nerve agent used in attack has Russian origin
London (United Kingdom) (AFP) - The world's chemical arms watchdog on Thursday said it had confirmed Britain's findings that a nerve agent used in an attack on a former spy and his daughter in England last month originally came from Russia.

Samples tested by the Organisation for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW) "confirm the findings of the United Kingdom relating to the identity of the toxic chemical," according to a summary of the Hague-based group's report released in London.

It added that "the toxic chemical was of high purity".

In a declassified summary of its findings, however, the OPCW did not make any assessment on who carried out the March 4 attack on former double agent Sergei Skripal and his daughter Yulia in the English city of Salisbury that also injured a police officer.

Britain and allies including the United States have blamed Moscow, sparking furious denials and provoking an international row resulting in the expulsions of diplomats from all sides.

The OPCW did not name the chemical, saying that information and its structure would be in a full classified report available to signatory states of the organisation.

Britain named it as Novichok, a group of powerful and deadly chemical compounds reportedly developed by the Soviet government in the 1970s and 1980s.

Prime Minister Theresa May's government has said Russia was known to have used it, and pointed to the country's pattern of "reckless behaviour", including the annexation of Crimea.

Russia has strongly denied any involvement, and insists it has destroyed all of its chemical weapons.

Skripal moved to Britain in a spy swap in 2010 and settled in Salisbury, and his daughter Yulia was visiting from Russia when they were poisoned, possibly on his front door.

Despite initial fears that they would not survive, Yulia Skripal was released from hospital to an undisclosed location earlier this week, while her father is said to be improving rapidly.

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Op donderdag 12 april 2018 14:31 schreef Frutsel het volgende:

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Op dinsdag 3 april 2018 20:26 schreef crystal_meth het volgende:

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Een vloeistof aan een deurklink strijken is geen rocket science. En als het een expert was geweest zou Skripal geen uur meer rondgelopen hebben.
Als het echt een expert was dan rijst de vraag waarom het zo ineffectief was. Oude voorraad?

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Russia hacked Yulia Skripal's emails for five years

Russian intelligence agents hacked Yulia Skripal's emails for at least five years before the Salisbury poisonings, a bombshell Government dossier has revealed.

Cyber specialists from the GRU - Moscow's Main Intelligence Directorate - targeted email accounts belonging to Miss Skripal as long ago as 2013, and possibly even before that, according to newly-declassified British intelligence.

Russian agents also tested the effectiveness of Novichok nerve agent smeared on door handles as part of a secret chemical weapons programme codenamed Foliant, it has emerged.