MOSCOW, March 4. /TASS/. London is trying to divert the attention of UK citizens from the ongoing Brexit negotiations using a diversionary ploy akin to "a dead cat on the kitchen table," Russia’s Foreign Ministry said on its Facebook page on Monday.
The Foreign Ministry’s statement focuses on the first anniversary of the alleged poisoning of Russian former military intelligence officer Sergei Skripal and his daughter Yulia in Salisbury in the UK.
"The Salisbury incident is a gimmick, a dead cat bounce that the British authorities tossed into the media coverage because for one thing they are expecting to distract the attention of ordinary citizens of their country from the subjects unpleasant for the establishment and to consolidate the nation in the face of ‘the ominous Russian threat,’" the ministry stressed.
The ‘dead cat’ topic was introduced into the political lexicon by none other than former UK Foreign Secretary Boris Johnson who outlined this peculiar method back in 2013 in his article for the Telegraph newspaper. This method works as follows: say a person loses an argument and all the facts are against him, you have to hurl an animal onto a dinner table so that the conversation will be only about that beast, the Russian Foreign Ministry said.
"In other words, they will start talking about a dead cat - the issue you want them to talk about - and they will stop talking about whatever was creating a headache for you," Russia’s Foreign Ministry explained.
"Brexit is the dispute and the headache of the Theresa May government," the ministry stressed.
The story around the Salisbury incident was a lifeline that London grabbed, since it is going down the thorny path of exiting the EU," Russia’s Foreign Ministry pointed out.
"This is a symbol of some last hope in a blind-alley. Something accidental and unplanned, some spontaneous miraculous providence. They are clinging to it, without thinking about the consequences," the ministry said.
"This expression can indeed be applied to international politics where there are quite a lot of extremely difficult and no-win situations," the ministry stressed.
The May Cabinet has ignored Russia’s numerous proposals on constructive cooperation into investigating the Skripal case since it has placed its stake on "the aggressive rhetoric that goes beyond all limits of decency and is replete with baseless accusations," Russia’s Foreign Ministry noted.
"The brazen media campaign full of shameless propagation of fake news has become a bona-fide corresponding trick along this political course," Russia’s Foreign Ministry pointed out.
As the UK asserts, former Russian military intelligence (GRU) Colonel Sergei Skripal who had been convicted in Russia of spying for Great Britain and later swapped for Russian intelligence officers, and his daughter Yulia suffered the effects of a nerve agent in the British city of Salisbury on March 4, 2018.
Claiming that the substance used in the attack had been a Novichok-class nerve agent developed in the Soviet Union, London rushed to accuse Russia of being involved in the incident.
Russia has flatly rejected all speculation on this score, pointing out that, no program of any kind for the development of this nerve agent had ever existed in either the Soviet Union or Russia.