LONDON, July 26. /TASS/. No one has so far been able to understand what substance British investigators looking into the Salisbury and Amesbury incidents are dealing with, a spokesman for the Russian embassy in Great Britain said on Thursday.
"Since there is no official information as to what actually happened in Salisbury and Amesbury, media leaks, speculations and bogus stories come as no surprise," he said. "However, no one has so far been able to understand what substance British investigators are dealing with. It is high time they provided actual facts instead of misleading people," the diplomat noted.
When asked if alleged Novichok victim Charles Rowley’s interview broadcast by ITV showed that he was not isolated anymore, the spokesman said that "we have taken notice of Charles Rowley’s interview."
"It must be said that it is not a full recording as the interview consists of several fragments. It is unclear why the full interview was not broadcast," he added.
According to the Russian diplomat, the interview did not provide answers to questions as to when and where it was recorded and if police were in control. The embassy spokesman also said that "along with the contradictory bogus stories the media present every day, it only clouds the situation further." Besides, in the diplomat’s view, Rowley’s words "complicate matters concerning the infamous Novichok nerve agent that the British authorities and media persistently attribute to Russia though it is a known fact that it can be produced in any professional laboratory."
British poisonings
According to London, 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 an alleged nerve agent in the British city of Salisbury on March 4. 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. Moscow rejected all of the United Kingdom’s accusations. Chief Executive of the Defense Science and Technology Laboratory (DSTL) at Porton Down Gary Aitkenhead said later that British experts had been unable to identify the origin of the nerve agent used in the attack on the Skripals
On June 30, 44-year-old Dawn Sturgess and 45-year-old Charles Rowley were hospitalized in critical condition in the British town of Amesbury. The Metropolitan Police went on to claim that the two had been exposed to Novichok, the same nerve agent that was allegedly used in the Skripal poisoning. After being mysteriously exposed to a nerve agent and falling into a coma, Sturgess died on July 8. Rowley was discharged from the hospital on July 20.