Theresa May Blames Russia for Nerve Agent Attack
The British prime minister said the
poisoning of a former Russian spy in southern England was either a
direct act by Russia or that the country had lost control of the deadly
nerve agent.
LONDON
— Britain’s prime minister said on Monday that it was “highly likely”
that Moscow was to blame for the poisoning of a former Russian spy
attacked with a nerve agent near his home in southern England, and she
warned of possible reprisals.
The
remarks by Prime Minister Theresa May, delivered in an address to
Parliament, were an unusually direct condemnation of a country that
Britain has, in the past, been loath to blame for attacks on its soil.
Critics say the British authorities took only modest countermeasures
after Russian agents poisoned a former MI6 informant in 2006 with the rare isotope polonium 210.
The
prime minister, who as home secretary resisted an open inquiry into
Russia’s role in that case, is under pressure to show more resolve this
time. The March 4 nerve agent attack on Sergei V. Skripal, once an
informant for Britain’s foreign intelligence service, and his daughter,
Yulia, exposed untold numbers of bystanders to risk around public spaces
in the city of Salisbury. Traces of the poison have been found at a pub
and a pizza parlor visited by the Skripals.
“It
is now clear that Mr. Skripal and his daughter were poisoned with a
military-grade nerve agent of a type developed by Russia,” Mrs. May said
in the House of Commons. “The government has concluded that it is
highly likely that Russia was responsible for the act against Sergei and
Yulia Skripal.”
She
said that either the poisoning was a “direct act of the Russian state
against our country” or that Moscow had lost control of its nerve agent
and had allowed it to get into the hands of others.
Russia has denied any responsibility.
In
an interview on Monday, Secretary of State Rex. W. Tillerson, expressed
astonishment at the use in a public space of a substance like the nerve
agent. “It’s almost beyond comprehension that a state, an organized
state, would do something like that,” he said. “A nonstate actor, I
could understand. A state actor I cannot understand why anyone would
take such an action.”
Mrs.
May said that her the government had summoned the Russian ambassador to
demand an explanation, and that Britain expected a response from Russia
by the end of the day on Tuesday. “Should there be no credible
response, we will conclude that this action amounts to an unlawful use
of force by the Russian state against the United Kingdom, and I will
come back to this House and set out the full range of measures we will
take in response,” she said.
“We shall not tolerate such a brazen act to murder innocent civilians on our soil,” the prime minister said.
The
relationship between Russia and Britain under Prime Minister May has
been punctuated by repeated confrontation, over the annexation of Crimea
and Russian interference in elections, among other issues.
But
Britain has held back from aggressive retaliatory measures. Expelling
Russian spies, for example, would mean a cutoff in Britain’s own flow of
information from Moscow if Russia retaliated. Restricting visas would
hurt Russian businessmen, officials and dissidents who have made Britain
their home.
Earlier on Monday, before Mr. Tillerson spoke, the White House took a different approach, declining to point a finger at Russia.
Sarah
Huckabee Sanders, the White House press secretary, said at her daily
briefing: “The use of a highly lethal nerve agent against U.K. citizens
on U.K. soil is an outrage. The attack was reckless, indiscriminate and
irresponsible. We offer the fullest condemnation.”
But
Ms. Sanders brushed off several questions about whether the White House
shared Britain’s view that Russia was responsible. “Right now we are
standing with our U.K. ally,” she said. “I think they’re still working
through even some of the details of that and we’re going to continue to
work with the U.K.”
Moscow has insisted that it played no role in the attack, and did so again on Monday.
“This
is a circus show in the British Parliament,” the Russian Foreign
Ministry spokeswoman, Maria Zakharova, told journalists in Moscow,
according to the Interfax news agency.
Vladimir
Dzhabarov, first deputy head of the Federation Council’s foreign
affairs committee, was equally dismissive. Whatever Mr. Skripal may have
once done, he said, he posed no threat to Russia now.
“This
already is not our issue,” Mr. Dzhabarov told Interfax. “He had access
neither to our secrets nor facilities. He was of no use to us, to Russia
in general.”
Still,
amid denials last week by Sergey V. Lavrov, Russia’s foreign minister,
an anchor on Russia’s state-controlled news broadcast struck a different
note, warning Russians not to betray their country. If they do, he
said, “Don’t choose Britain as a place to live.”
In
her address to Parliament, Mrs. May said the nerve agent was part of a
group known as Novichok — the Russian term for “newcomer.” The chemical
was produced by the Soviet Union in the 1970s and 1980s, and, at the
time, it was believed to be far more lethal than anything in the United
States arsenal.
After
the breakup of the Soviet Union, Vil Mirzayanov, a chemist who helped
develop the agent, said that Soviet laboratories had developed enough of
the substance to kill several hundred thousand people.
Dispersed
in a powder, Novichok nerve agents blocked the breakdown of a
neurotransmitter controlling muscular contractions, leading to
respiratory and cardiac arrest, Mr. Mirzayanov told investigators at the
time.
The
use of a nerve agent drew the attention of the Organization for the
Prohibition of Chemical Weapons, the group that polices the global
treaty banning them. The group, based in The Hague, called it “a source
of great concern.”
Almost
two dozen people in Salisbury, including emergency workers, were given
medical treatment related to the attack, and one police officer is still
hospitalized.
Over
the past week, chemical weapons experts fanned out through the sleepy
cathedral city of Salisbury, and residents who may have been near Mr.
Skripal and his daughter were told to wash their clothing and carefully wipe off other articles. Politicians have urged the government to respond.
“What
it says to Russians living in the U.K. or those thinking of leaving the
country is: Disloyalty is always punishable, you will never be free of
us and you will never be safe, wherever you live,” John Lough and James
Sherr, Russia specialists at the British think tank Chatham House, wrote. “What it says to the British government is: We believe you are weak, we have no respect for you.”
Mr. Skripal is one of several opponents of President Vladimir V. Putin’s government,
in Britain and elsewhere, who have been the victims of murder or
attempted murder. Western intelligence officials say that the Kremlin
has frequently had its foes killed. The most notorious case involved
another former Russian agent, Alexander V. Litvinenko, who was fatally
poisoned in London in 2006 with a radioactive element, an assassination
that a British inquiry later concluded was probably approved personally by Mr. Putin.
The British government has, however, been accused of dragging its feet in investigating previous suspicious deaths.
On Tuesday, Yvette Cooper, a lawmaker with the opposition Labour Party, submitted a letter to Britain’s home secretary demanding a review of 14 deaths
which “have not been treated as suspicious by the U.K. police but have —
reportedly — been identified by United States intelligence sources as
potentially connected to the Russian state.”
But
with the intense attention focused on the poisoning of Mr. Skripal, 66,
and his daughter, 33, the government response has been swifter.
Officials
from across the British political spectrum have called for a wide range
of retaliatory measures against Russia, including the expulsion of
diplomats, new economic sanctions, tighter controls on wealthy Russians
entering Britain, and the revocation of the broadcast license of RT, the
Kremlin-controlled broadcaster.
Britain
must ensure that Russia’s oligarchs “realize that they can’t spend
their wealth in London, that they can’t enjoy the luxuries of Harrods
and whatever else, and that we’re absolutely firm in making sure that
they feel the pain of being denied entry into the West,” Tom Tugendhat,
chairman of the Foreign Affairs Committee in the House of Commons, told BBC Radio on Monday.
But
expelling Russian intelligence agents would mean that Britain would
lose some of its own agents in Moscow, which would have steep costs for
London, according to John Bayliss, who retired in 2010 from the
Government Communications Headquarters, Britain’s electronic
intelligence agency.
“It
will cut off a flow of intelligence you have had for years,” he said.
“That will stop you gaining intelligence in future years, which would be
critical.”
Mr.
Skripal and his daughter remained in critical condition on Monday, more
than a week after being poisoned in Salisbury, where Mr. Skripal had
lived quietly for years. The pair were found incoherent on a park bench,
and a police officer who made contact with the nerve agent when he
tried to help the Skripals, Detective Sgt. Nick Bailey, was also
hospitalized in serious condition.
While
working for Russian military intelligence, Mr. Skripal became a double
agent, selling secrets to Britain. He was found out, convicted and sent
to a Russian prison in 2006. In 2010, he was freed and sent to Britain
in a spy swap with the West.
