Skripals – The Mystery Deepens 3063


The time that “Boshirov and Petrov” were allegedly in Salisbury carrying out the attack is all entirely within the period the Skripals were universally reported to have left their home with their mobile phones switched off.

A key hole in the British government’s account of the Salisbury poisonings has been plugged – the lack of any actual suspects. And it has been plugged in a way that appears broadly convincing – these two men do appear to have traveled to Salisbury at the right time to have been involved.

But what has not been established is the men’s identity and that they are agents of the Russian state, or just what they did in Salisbury. If they are Russian agents, they are remarkably amateur assassins. Meanwhile the new evidence throws the previously reported timelines into confusion – and demolishes the theories put out by “experts” as to why the Novichok dose was not fatal.

This BBC report gives a very useful timeline summary of events.

At 09.15 on Sunday 4 March the Skripals’ car was seen on CCTV driving through three different locations in Salisbury. Both Skripals had switched off their mobile phones and they remained off for over four hours, which has baffled geo-location.

There is no CCTV footage that indicates the Skripals returning to their home. It has therefore always been assumed that they last touched the door handle around 9am.

But the Metropolitan Police state that Boshirov and Petrov did not arrive in Salisbury until 11.48 on the day of the poisoning. That means that they could not have applied a nerve agent to the Skripals’ doorknob before noon at the earliest. But there has never been any indication that the Skripals returned to their home after noon on Sunday 4 March. If they did so, they and/or their car somehow avoided all CCTV cameras. Remember they were caught by three CCTV cameras on leaving, and Borishov and Petrov were caught frequently on CCTV on arriving.

The Skripals were next seen on CCTV at 13.30, driving down Devizes road. After that their movements were clearly witnessed or recorded until their admission to hospital.

So even if the Skripals made an “invisible” trip home before being seen on Devizes Road, that means the very latest they could have touched the doorknob is 13.15. The longest possible gap between the novichok being placed on the doorknob and the Skripals touching it would have been one hour and 15 minutes. Do you recall all those “experts” leaping in to tell us that the “ten times deadlier than VX” nerve agent was not fatal because it had degraded overnight on the doorknob? Well that cannot be true. The time between application and contact was between a minute and (at most) just over an hour on this new timeline.

In general it is worth observing that the Skripals, and poor Dawn Sturgess and Charlie Rowley, all managed to achieve almost complete CCTV invisibility in their widespread movements around Salisbury at the key times, while in contrast “Petrov and Boshirov” managed to be frequently caught in high quality all the time during their brief visit.

This is especially remarkable in the case of the Skripals’ location around noon on 4 March. The government can only maintain that they returned home at this time, as they insist they got the nerve agent from the doorknob. But why was their car so frequently caught on CCTV leaving, but not at all returning? It appears very much more probable that they came into contact with the nerve agent somewhere else, while they were out.

“Boshirov and Petrov” plainly are of interest in this case. But only Theresa May stated they were Russian agents: the police did not, and stated that they expected those were not their real identities. We do not know who Boshirov and Petrov were. It appears very likely their appearance was to do with the Skripals on that day. But they may have been meeting them, outside the home. The evidence points to that, rather than doorknobs. Such a meeting might explain why the Skripals had turned off their mobile phones to attempt to avoid surveillance.

It is also telling the police have pressed no charges against them in the case of Dawn Sturgess, which would be manslaughter at least if the government version is true.

If “Boshirov and Petrov” are secret agents, their incompetence is astounding. They used public transport rather than a vehicle and left the clearest possible CCTV footprint. They failed in their assassination attempt. They left traces of novichok everywhere and could well have poisoned themselves, and left the “murder weapon” lying around to be found. Their timings in Salisbury were extremely tight – and British Sunday rail service dependent.

There are other possibilities of who “Boshirov and Petrov” really are, of which Ukrainian is the obvious one. One thing I discovered when British Ambassador to Uzbekistan was that there had been a large Ukrainian ethnic group of scientists working at the Soviet chemical weapon testing facility there at Nukus. There are many other possibilities.

Yesterday’s revelations certainly add to the amount we know about the Skripal event. But they raise as many new questions as they give answers.


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3,063 thoughts on “Skripals – The Mystery Deepens

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  • Made by Dom

    I’m not buying this idea that Russian assassins are noted for their level of professionalism. Perhaps in James Bond films?
    But the whole ‘incompetent, leaving traces of poison everywhere’ line sounds remarkably similar to the Litvinenko killers.

    • Jack

      Wouldnt surprise me that they are ill or even dead themselves so clumsy they apparently were.
      But I am sure russians would recongize these two people and tell the world who they are, those accusations and claims will of course be ridden with disinformation. But having your face printed world wide as suspect in a crime, its not really a situation you could escape from..

    • Charles Bostock

      Soviet agents (assassins) were indeed noted for their “professionalism” but that merely reflected a feeling among some disaffected and misguided elements in the West that everything was better in the Soviet Union. In reality, the Soviet secret services were no more and no less bunglers than any other secret service, and money for value-wise didn’t rank too highly.

    • Paul Greenwood

      Litvinenko was playing with Berezhovsky and the Chechens. you really should look very deeply into Litvinenko and how much Berezhovsky wanted rid of him…….but you may be onto something if you connect Pablo “D-Notice” Miller into the loop or the Dodgy Dossier Man of Steele

  • Michael Sinclair

    Ok so my question would be, in the sam time scale in the Salsbury Area who got killed and was not in the News? Why did the Skipals try to Assasinate someone with a nerve agent.
    We know they did it wrong or they would never have been contaminated by it.?????

    • SA

      The answer is Nikolai Glushkov. Although he was another Russian fugitive, wanted for some financial irregularities, his death has hardly been discussed by anyone. But I do not think the Skripals did it.

  • Keltro

    In these situations the word of the Police is far more credible than a politically biased organisation.
    Questions.
    1.The “traces” of novichok at the hotel… does that info come from the police?
    2. Someone e.g. hotel staff must have spoken to the individuals. Did they speak good English?

    Please I notice postings on this thread not relevant to current events. Could we please just try to dissect the latest developments.

    • Hatuey

      No. It’s boring. Stop pretending that the comments on here in this case are likely to yield any results. They’ve been babbling on about the Skripals here for many months and everybody is more confused today than they were beforehand.

      • Keltro

        Surely someone here lives nearby the London hotel. A simple knock on the door and inquiry might help.
        I agree its all confusing. If you start with a premise the Mexicans did it probably it wouldn’t be too hard to find Mexicans with some travels to Salisbury. Does that prove the Mexicans did it?

      • Kevin

        Yeah. We should all just shrug and say ‘So what?’ every time a blog uncovers the damning truth.
        Let’s talk about football and..

        Btw, seen the front pages of the popular press today? Thank goodness they’re allowed to go unchallenged, eh?

        • Hatuey

          There’s no damning proof, you crackpot. If there was damning proof, I’d be over the moon — it would mean that we could drop this trivial subject once and for all.

          The real damning truth is that you will never know what happened. Any story that involves intelligence services is doomed to be shrouded in mystery forever.

          It’s one thing to indulge in this junk but another to demand that the rest of us do too.

    • MaryPaul

      As someone who lived in London for many years, I do not share your confidence in the honesty or indeed the probity of the Met police, when viewed at close quarters. I have seen that they can and do make things up to fit their version of events. I have no experience of the Wiltshire police and cannot comment on how trustworthy they are.

  • Goose

    Novichok victim Charlie Rowley became contaminated after breaking bottle, brother says – Torygraph headline

    “The Salisbury man struck down by the Novichok nerve agent which killed his girlfriend was contaminated when the container containing the chemical weapon splintered in his hand, his brother revealed on Sunday.”

    • uncle tungsten

      The Charlie and Dawn scenario tells me that the ‘russian assassins’ have no comprehension of the devastation on the UK caused by austerity policy settings in the Tory government and its Labor (tory) predecessors. Their entire strategy is unraveling because UK can’t even empty a dumpster bin in a month or more and the charity stores are so overwhelmed by poverty calls that they no longer have time to empty their collection bins on a monthly basis. The streets must be awash with trash and rats like it was a century ago.

      The russians don’t stand a chance in this environment no matter how skilled their GRU finest are.

    • Paul Greenwood

      why not simple organophosphate like British troops used in The Gulf for “Gulf War Syndrome” ?

  • mike

    Focus today is on Trump. All eyes on Idlib. That’s where recent events are leading to – the last stand of Regime Change Proxies Inc. Corbyn has finally been nobbled; Russia has been demonised; Trump has been isolated.

    The ground work for a hot war with the Russians has been prepared.

      • Jack

        West lose? Not likely at all, west is superior on the military front on all aspects, which makes the scaremongering about Russia so ridiculous.

        • Agent Green

          Western missile technology is up to 10 years behind Russia. The west has no Hypersonic missiles while Russia has one actively fielded right now. Russia is also significantly ahead in signal jamming, electronic warfare.

          In any event, I said the West would lose largely because there would be no winners. Nuclear war would ensure total destruction of most life in Western countries and Russia. There wouldn’t be much left.

          • Jack

            Agent Orange

            Completely false.
            Russia is behind on every front, especially on air, sub, naval capabilities, even their ICBMs are aging.

          • Mick

            Fair comment about the Hypersonic missiles, but you forgot to mention that the Americans have already stole that technology.

        • Putins Bud

          Take your rose tinted glasses off and read “Losing Military Supremacy: The Myopia of American Strategic Planning” by Andrei Martyanov. It will be no walkover when the shit hits the fan

        • joeblogs

          Do you live on planet Mars?
          Thought not.
          You’ll die just like the rest of us if the worst happens.

          • D_Majestic

            He won’t, Joe. He’ll be in a Deep Underground Installation. Or so he would have us believe.

    • Goose

      That’s got to be the fear. The idea a qualified surgeon Assad(hardly a stupid man) would order a chemical attack in a war that is over on an area that’s surrounded, is utterly ludicrous. But as long as our western leaders think they can persuade enough of the population it’ll be enough for one to happen. It’ll likely be chlorine again , no doubt replete with video images instantly shown around the world. Depressing as hell the west has come to this.

      • Agent Green

        And order a chemical weapon attack when he already has the full support of Russian air power (including strategic bombers) and cruise missiles.

        • Goose

          Logical questions like that aren’t asked by the MSM though. They just report what they are told to report these days.

          The Syrian conflict has been bloody awful, no doubt about that, and Assad and the Russians have used brutal tactics – look at the flattened towns, cities, so for western audiences believing chemical bombs are being used is an easy sell. We all know, with the conventional firepower of Syria/Russia and Iran + militias there is no logical reason to use chemical bombs at this late stage giving the western powers their justification..

          • SA

            But the only reason for using chemical weapons would be to preserve these buildings that these Russians and Syrians are, as you say, flattening. And for this to be a successful strategy it has to be used extensively and radically, not merely causing a few deaths and difficulty in breathing in others.

          • Paul Greenwood

            I am so pleased Raqqa and Fallujah only suffered love-bombs from the US/UK – I know how carefully the Anglo-Americans bomb cities – with lovely little bows on the soft velvet liners

          • Chris

            @Paul Greenwood – “I know how carefully the Anglo-Americans bomb cities – with lovely little bows on the soft velvet liners”

            Yes, Bomber Harris’s visits to Dresden very sensitively done…

      • MJ

        It doesn’t seem long ago that the west was claiming that ISIS, Al-Nusra Front et al were the enemy. Now that Syria and its allies have done what the west seemed unable to do and defeat them, suddenly these terror groups our our friends who need protecting at all costs. Ho hum.

    • Charles Bostock

      Mike

      Do be quiet, old chap. Quick research reveals that there have been predictions of WW3 almost since this blog started. You and your ilk must be very disappointed!

      • laguerre

        You’re right, there won’t be a war, because the US doesn’t really have a choice over Idlib. They’ve lost the war in Syria, and launching hundreds of missiles is not going to turn it around. The nutters in Washington must be tempted to double down, but I think when it comes down to it, they’ll hesitate, because the only thing they’ll get is a quagmire. And poor old Trump distracted by the stories of confusion in the White House.

        • Charles Bostock

          Thanks for that. But you know, I wasn’t only referring to some zanies predicting the outbreak of WW3 over Syria. They make a habit about it, don’t they. Today it’s over Syria, yesterday it was over Ukraine, the day before yesterday it was about….oh, look up previous examples yourself if you’re not convinced. The important thing to remember is that – despite the wishes of the zanies – neither the US nor Russia are going to go to war with each other.

        • Borncynical

          Laguerre, but a ‘quagmire’ is what they want. The Washington Post quoted an unnamed Administration official (believed by some to most likely have the initials JB) as saying a few days ago that “right now, our job is to help create quagmires [for Russia and Syrian ‘regime’] until we get what we want.”

          • laguerre

            “Laguerre, but a ‘quagmire’ is what they want.”

            You misunderstand. I mean quagmire for the Americans. The Yanks are threatening eternal war, thinking that will frighten Syria, Russia, Iran, etc., but it isn’t the case. The threat is to the US, drawing the US more and more into running a war, with risk of war with Russia as the prize, all the time while the White House is falling into a state of confusion. Trump won’t like having to stay in Washington running a war, while all he wants is his weekends in Mar-a-largo.

  • AJ

    Yesterdays revelations raise more questions than answers. The public is slowly learning not to take news, media, and government stories at face value. We often do not learn the truth till well after the event. Reporting is more often than not “fake” and politically motivated.

  • Jones

    just some observations on location and timeline of the other CCTV images on Sunday 4th March supplied on Met police website

    Photo 4 / 11:48 alleged suspects exit Salisbury train station.
    Photo 5 / 11:58 photo location is right outside the Shell petrol station close to where Cherry Orchard Lane meets Wilton Road, it is about 1,000 meters north-west of train station and took suspects 10 minutes to walk there, Skripal house in Christie Miller Road is about 625 meters further north from photo 5.
    Photo 6 / 13:05 this photo location is the bridge over the River Avon where Fisherton Street meets Bridge Street, NOTE this location is in the total opposite direction to photo 5, photo 5 is ”North-West” of train station but photo 6 is actually ”South-East” of train station, it is about 650 meters south-east of train station and about 2,275 meters south-east of Skripal house, suspects are photoed on bridge over River Avon walking north-west from town centre towards train station and are on left side of road.
    Photo 7 / 13:08 is about 220 meters north-west of river bridge in photo 6, it is the corner of where Summerlock Approach meets Fisherton Street, suspects have crossed the road and are now on the right side of the road walking north-west and appear that they may be heading along Summerlock Approach.
    Photo 8 / 13:50 suspects back at Salisbury train station.

    Met police claim suspects attacked Skripal house moments after photo 5 at 11:58 and the next photo was at 13:05, this means they would have had to walk the 625 meters to Skripal house, walk down a cul de sac in middle of day, put novichok on door handle in full view of potential witnesses (presumably not worrying if anyone came to door or saw them out of window), walk back the 1,625 meters to train station, walk a further 650 meters ”past” the train station towards the town centre, at some unknown point double back and walk from town centre area towards train station again getting caught on CCTV walking north-west on river bridge over River Avon at 13:05. They had 77 minutes to do this, the walk alone would have taken a minimum of 29 minutes (that is providing they turned round at exactly the river bridge and walked no further which they almost certainly would have done), therefore a maximum of approx 48 minutes is unaccounted for.

    Some great observations on topic, i did notice Boshirov was carrying rucksack in photos 4 & 5 but Petrov was carrying same rucksack in photos 6 & 7, not that that means anything, nor do the photos provide any evidence as to nationality or identity of suspects or why they were in Salisbury and passports provide what are said to be false names only. Only evidence is that these two males happened to be in Salisbury on the same day for reasons known only to themselves.

    • Steve Jones

      These are just the images that the Met have released. There are very likely more. As to this only being evidence that two males happened to be in Salisbury on the same day for reasons only known to themselves, it should be born in mind that they were clearly not travelling independently, they were in Salisbury two days in a row, both for a relatively short time. They were only in the UK for a very short period, and had left the country at what must have been near enough the first flight they could get on after leaving Salisbury. There’s no obvious reason that’s been uncovered for why they were in the UK other than this episode.There are also reports of trace amounts of Novichok found in their hotel room.

      There is such a thing as circumstantial evidence and suspicious behaviour, but unless you are suggesting the authorities have completely faked all this, which would have required dozens, if not hundreds of people to be involved (not all of them work for the security agencies) then this all looks damning.

      Also, Craig Murray’s pours cold water on the evidence claiming that the timings are suspicious and don’t add up (and jumping to conclusions, such as he did over the “time warp” photos) yet he goes on later to suggest that it was Ukrainian nationals that are likely to have done this under a false flag attack. It’s not possible to have it both ways. Either it’s not credible that these two could have carried out the attack or these two did carry out the attack (false flag or not). It’s not possible to have it both ways.

  • TJ

    People in Russia have been trying to track down the suspects-

    https://translate.google.com/translate?hl=&sl=ru&tl=en&u=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.fontanka.ru%2F2018%2F09%2F05%2F075%2F&sandbox=1/

    a couple of interesting bits –

    “The suspects bought tickets on foreign passports of the “65” series, the document numbers differ by the last digit: … 1297 and … 1294.”

    and –

    “According to Fontanka, Boshirova and Petrova, foreign passports (conventional, non-biometric) were issued about two years ago when they began to issue forms of the 65th series.”

    Which is interesting because if you look at the Wikipedia page here –

    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Russian_passport

    it is clear that non biometric passports have a stamp on the passport picture, yet there is no stamp on the pictures released by the Police, the question is, where did the pictures come from if not the passports?

    • Igor M.

      It looks like that “newspaper” or an “internet newspaper” as they call themselves, is relying on not only anonymous, but unqualified altogether, sources- “according to the data at Fontanka”… What data, made up one? Would be interesting to find out who funds this “Fontanka”

  • Jack

    Agent Orange

    Completely false, Russia is behind on every front, especially on air, sub, naval capabilities, heck even their ICBMs are aging.

    • Agent Green

      Plenty of evidence to dispute this, but no point in raising it here. It’s off topic anyway.

        • Agent Green

          Defence budget is irrelevant if you have a system in America which is built on wasting money, building pointless weapons that don’t work and not focused on the right things. They focused on fighting peasants in the Middle East whereas Russia has focused solely on defence against Western high-tech forces (hence the emphasis and large advantage over the West in areas of missiles and electronic warfare).

          The West has admitted itself that Russia is ahead in at least these two areas.

          • Jack

            Agent Green

            Laughable, there is a reason why US is a superpower and this because they have a strong military force, add the western nations in Nato. Russia have no chance.

        • Agent Green

          Read this – Losing Military Supremacy: The Myopia of American Strategic Planning” by Andrei Martyanov.

    • nevermind

      No need yacking on about war, boadt the lenght of each others missiles.
      Fact is that the ECM and ECCM in the west are inferior, as the Black sea incident showed some years back.

      For any country to.go to war over lies and innuendo, pretending that they have our security in mind, when they dare not ask us.

  • Peter Joyce

    Craig. Can Scotland Yard identify the location of the camera that took the picture with the unfeasibly wide yellow line. We can then go along and inspect it? If they cannot or will not do this then suspicion that this picture is doctored will remain.

  • Mist001

    Where is all this leading? That the state lies to us? Most of the followers of this blog know this already, so it’s kind of preaching to the converted. Suppose all the theories which have been published here since the event took place were proven to be true. What then? Would it be a case of ‘See? I told you so, I was right all along!’ and that’s it? Onto a different subject?

    Nothing’s going to change, the state will continue to lie, so does it matter if it was the UK government, a rogue Porton Down employee, Mossad or the Russians did it? It matters not one jot.

  • Kenneth G Coutts

    The Skripals could give us the truth.
    I can handle the truth.
    They have left it to long for the truth.
    ??

    • Agent Green

      Yes, it is a bit strange that we haven’t heard directly from them. Why can’t they just tell us exactly from their own mouths what happened that day. We only hear it second hand from Police and Theresa May.

  • Republicofscotland

    There appears to be more holes in the Scotland Yard, British government’s version of events than in a Swiss cheese.

    But the point that they’re trying to get across is very clear, if not suspect. That Russia is without doubt the guilty party.

    • rob

      and going the other way

      Departure: Scheduled: 22:30 (22:30 UTC) Actual: 22:47 (22:47 UTC)

      https://www.flightera.net/flight_details/Aeroflot/SU2585/EGLL/2018-03-04

      “From Heathrow Airport, they returned to Moscow on Aeroflot flight SU2585, departing at 10.30pm on Sunday, 4 March.”

      could just be lazy, but why list the scheduled rather than actual time? different website unfortunately, so no guarantee the much larger time issue on the arrival isn’t just down to data display

    • isa

      The flight took 03h18 minutes so you are totally correct. They did not arrive at 15h00 but at 15h57 (3 hours behind Russia in winter timetable ) . This means if they are caught on CCTV at 16h22 minutes leaving the airport through those narrow channels towards the public area (not the plane jetty bridge) that is the quickest unboarding and passport control voyage ever. Possible but highly unlikely. One thing is very clear then: there is no way these two men could have had checked luggage in the hold and there is then zero possibilities that they are carrying a boxed and wrapped bottle of perfume in their hand luggage as this would have to be out of the box inside a transparent zip bag for airport security x-ray inspection .

      • reiner Tor

        That’s wrong, the transparent zip bag could’ve been put back into the bag. In fact, that’s how most people do that. Why would they keep the zip bag separate after the inspections..?

        • Isa

          Reiner , the box of perfume that was wrapped in plastic would need to be opened and the actual bottle of perfume would have to pass security x-ray outside of its box . Since the box was found totally intact in its packaging by rowley it is not possible that these two brought it with them with only hand luggage . All hand luggage liquids must be visible and inserted in a transparent zip bag , placed on a tray and pass airport security x-ray. You can’t place a wrapped bottle inside a box there . The box must be opened and the plastic wrapping removed .

          • Ort

            Ah, then surely that backpack must have contained a special portable shrink-wrapping unit; then the operatives could’ve re-wrapped the perfume bottle at their leisure!

            I won’t bother with tags. I’m being sarcastic– not towards you, Isa, for making a lucid point. I’m just mocking the amateur “espionage thriller” screenwriter mentality that has complicated analysis from the beginning.

            It’s just too easy to manufacture broadly plausible explanations for every bit of dodgy and contradictory evidence– all the more so because so much of the putative “evidence” has been presented by manifestly compromised and corrupt official and mass-media sources.

      • Rob

        Don’t forget that security would have been on the Russian side so if they were GRU it could be that they were allowed through with no check

        • gbrbsb

          Further, I wouldn’t necessarily go by what Rowley says. First he said the bottle had splintered and spilt when it clearly didn’t, so he changed that to it spilt over him when he was trying to attach the applicator.

          IMHO, the bottle itself could be an real Nina Ricci tester with a modified sprayer rather than a total counterfeit as it does have the Nina Ricci name and decoration and the box looks the real thing for that particular perfume. The modification would have to adapt the actual egress for gels which have too much viscosity to disperse as a spray and rather come out in squiggles. And a toxin as a spray would be too dangerous for those applying it. The the long tube was presumably to keep the toxin as directional and as far away from the hand of the person applying it although pressure could force the gel to leak through the join of the tube with the top.

          And would assassins remove the tube after application endangering themselves unnecessarily, (Rowley said he had to fit the applicator if he can be believed on this either), or merely throw it away as is?

    • State Agent

      The early WTC 7 fall fake reporting by the beeb also occured due to the one hour BST/GMT gap, the rest as poor Jane Standley found out, is conspiracy theory !!

  • isa

    Excellent post Craig.

    I would add the following:

    Are we to believe that the house of a former Russian Spy, Former MI6 spy in the UK was not under permanent surveillance? I am not that gullible. Of course it is under surveillance and that excludes that these men ever novichoked a door handle without being caught on UK Intelligence surveillance.

    Then as you write, the amateur character of their work. Travelling direct, taking public transport , operating duringbroad day light, pottering about after the crime in Salisbury, the unusually hyper clear CCTV images .

    I would speculate that it is rather easy to get two people to be in a place in order to build up a story backed up by CCTV. A scheduled meeting /sales call -one works in a company that develops vaccinations , a job interview, or since Salisbury seems to be the preferred residence of double agents and their recruiter they could be UK intelligence assets. But I would also speculate that you can be correct as to their nationality. Everything is just too clumsy for the GRU. The totally chaotic and amateurish way this was done reminds me of the Babchenko farce. Unware patsies or clumsy intelligence agents for another country I am quite certain these guys are not GRU. If they are, they certainly need refresher intensive spy/ assassination technique trainning.

    Why did they not charge with relation to Charlie and Dawn? If they could they would have done so, but they can’t. The OPCW report made sure of that when in paragraph 12 it states that they could not say if the 2 samples of the publiclly unidentified chemical came from the same batch.

    • MaryPaul

      Well if they were merely tourists interested in Salisbury’s old buildings, or even old buddies looking up Sergei, let the Russians produce them to tell us this. Or if they are Ukrainians masquerading as Russians who wanted to kill the Skripals. let Russia tell us how they were hoodwinked by them. Come on you trolls. give us a clue.

      • isa

        Mary , how would you expect the Russians to prove that these men were Ukranian , if that is the case and then to produce them to anyone if they are citizens of another country or live in another country?

  • Steve

    Care to explain why, if the two “assassins” never actually entered Salisbury until after the Skripals had left their house that, the house is to be demolished? How can there possibly be a Novichock contamination in the Skripals house if the assassins didn’t arrive until after they had left it for the final time?

  • Dungroanin

    Wonderful stuff Craig Murray and contributers.

    I’ll add my tuppence worth on the much delayed cctv pitiful few photo’s- where is the rest of it? There must be masses.

    After all they installed a state of the art sustem in 2017 covering Amesbury too.

    ‘Work is well underway to install a brand new state-of-the-art CCTV system in Salisbury, with some cameras now live.

    The system, which we’ve funded, is part of the package of assets which was formally transferred to Salisbury City Council in April this year.

    The system is being installed by contractors Openview, and will be operated by Citywatch paid staff and volunteers from the offices at Bourne Hill. Citywatch are fully co-operating with Wiltshire Police under an agreed protocol to allow access to footage where appropriate.

    At the same time, work has begun on Amesbury and Wilton’s systems, which will also be run by their respective town councils.

    Jerry Wickham, Wiltshire Council cabinet member for public protection, said: “I am delighted work is well underway on the new CCTV system. This process has taken longer than any of us had wanted, however the hard work with our partners is now paying off, and the people of Salisbury can be reassured their city is being overseen by a state-of-the-art modern system.

    “We’ll continue to work with partners throughout this installation process and make sure they and the public are fully updated on its progress.

    http://www.wiltshire.gov.uk/news/articles/salisbury-cctv-system-being-installed-first-cameras-are-live
    ‘Mike Withers, chair of Citywatch said: “The Salisbury Partnership established by Salisbury BID and Salisbury City Council is now successfully operating as Citywatch and is delighted that the city CCTV system is operational again. We are pleased that Wiltshire Council are able to deliver a state of the art system, enabling us to punch above our weight in terms of security and crime prevention. It demonstrates the importance of Salisbury as a successful Purple Flag accredited city”.

    The council has worked with Wiltshire Police, Salisbury City Council, Salisbury BID, Citywatch, Salisbury Chamber of Commerce, Wilton Town Council and Amesbury Town Council on this project.’

    The can of worms just keeps spilling and giving. The utter big lie that Tess spewed to parliament yesterday, no doubt hothoused with the MSM in some summer camp – is the autumn offensive underway.

  • J Galt

    Six months and this is the best they could come up with?

    Just what are we paying these people for!?

  • Republicofscotland

    Indeed Yaggi the Ripple Effect blew the establishments version of events right out of the water.

  • Sharp Ears

    Soon to be back in the news today.

    Here she is IN A FRILLY PINK GET UP (OMG)at the UK garden party in NY. I see she had her best friend Haley along.

    Karen Pierce (@KarenPierceUN) · Twitter
    https://twitter.com/KarenPierceUN

    Hats off to all of our UN colleagues who joined us on the lawn @UN to celebrate the end of our #UNSC Presidency with a Great British Garden Party. After a month of important discussion & debate, its good to connect with #UNSC colleagues & share ?? culture. #SartorialDiplomacy
    pic.twitter.com/Ajg7tDX…
    6 days ago · Twitter

    • Borncynical

      Rather understated for her, don’t you think? Rogues gallery. I’m not expecting any revelations at todays UNSC proceedings but it’ll be very interesting just to observe how exactly it is all handled.

  • Stu

    The most ridiculous thing in this conspiracy is that two dodgy looking men walked into a middle class housing estate in the south east of England on a Sunday morning without arousing any suspicion.

    England is a nation of curtain twitchers! There is no chance that this pair would have escaped the attention of local busybodies.

    • Igor M.

      Hilarious, but the “hotel” where the two were staying and “Novichok” was leaking (apparently) are so fine that even when “the police” discovered it, there wasn’t a pip of what was going on nor evident decontamination???

      • MaryPaul

        Clearly you are unfamiliar with D notices. I suggest you go and read up – you can find it on Wikipedia.

        • Igor M.

          Why on earth would anyone give a D notice on a “decon” op in London when similar “decon” ops in Salisbury and Amesbury were headline news?! You are getting more comical by the minute! Oh, and even despite the D-Notices, people in London would take photos and talk about it on the social media!

    • MaryPaul

      yes I posted a report from the Guardian a couple of days back about the vehicles going into landfill. it is on the previous Skripal thread here.

      • Ort

        Despite my constant complaints about irresponsible speculation, I can’t resist wondering if at least one of the vanished Skripals is inside the boot of one of those interred vehicles.

  • DelicateDave

    Here’s an idea. What if these two Russian were in Salisbury to meet with the Skripals on the business of the Russian government but rather than there to murder, they were there simply to meet and to discuss Skripal going back to Russian – something he is known to have wanted to do.
    If this was the case it still leaves open the question “who did it” but that opens the door for the British government doesn’t it? A Russian double agent meeting Russians. Would the UK want that? is that not more a motive then Putin waking up one day and deciding he’s going to kill some old double agent with all the risks that go with that?
    Perhaps the UK secret services did not know about his daughter coming and the plan was he would be found dead with no questions asked. Add in the 14 or so other cases that the UK government have determined are not worth looking any further into and could the be a pattern?

  • Oliver Behrend

    Craig, this piece is as good as ever. You are raising the right questions, as it is being done in the recent article on the matter by Moon of Alabama. I do also agree with most of your conclusions. I disagree with one. You write: “only Theresa May stated they were Russian agents: the police did not…It appears very likely their appearance was to do with the Skripals on that day”. Please, where is the logical bridge leading to that conclusion ? Or, am I dealing with a mistake in writing ? Likely in-stead of unlikely ? Anyway, we now got the third version concerning the “perpetrators”. At first, they named a certain “Gordon”, perhaps having been inspired by Hamish de Bretton-Gordon. Then, suddenly again, they re-identified the footage showing the Skripals in front of the restaurant as showing “the perpetrators”, a man and a woman. Now the third version.
    The whole thing reminds me as well as many others not only of Tony Blair and his lies about Irak. It reminds me also of the alleged attack on a German radio station by Poland (Station Gliwice) in 1939, an invention by Goebbels. And it reminds me of an an article in the The Guardian which they would not publish again on the alleged Zinoviev letter > https://www.theguardian.com/politics/1999/feb/04/uk.politicalnews6.
    But isn´t useless to demand evidence or even prove ? One headline in the UK government´s paper, the Independent (4 April 2018), has already fixed it all: “Whether we can prove Moscow´s involve-ment in the Skripal cas or not is irrelevant”.

  • Trowbridge H. Ford

    Can anyone show us that the two men claimed to be the alleged assassins are Russian nationals who work for the GRU?

    Mossad agents have carried assassinations in Britain on several occasions without being even suspected officially, much less tried and being convicted. Royal Cadet nStephen Hilder, Dr. David Kelly, and “Sasha’ come immediately too mind. Then there is the unsolved murders of the al-Hillis et al. when they went to France.

    Passports can easily be fabricated, and travel to Moscow can be arranged by everyone.

    • John2o2o

      My understanding is that there are a couple of Poles who think they’ve won the lotto, courtesy of MI6. All they had to do was pose for a couple of photos.

  • Andrew S Carter

    According to Google maps, the distance from Salisbury Station to the Skripal’s home takes 18 – 20 minutes to walk; either we need to hear about taxi journeys between these destinations, or you can shave another 40 minutes off of the period between 11:48 and 13:15 when Operation Smear-the-Door-Handle would have taken place.

    Precision operators, these Russians – split second timing, not a drop of Novichok spilt (just lobbed away in a bin, inside a Nina Ricci bottle which has the miraculous quality of being able to reassemble itself after falling apart in Charlie Rowley’s hands)

    Or not, as the case may be

  • Jeremn

    Why go to Salisbury twice?

    Were these two sent to Salisbury because Sergei told Moscow that he wanted to come home? Was it a trick? Or was it true? First visit logistics. Second visit documents? Whatever, unwittingly, they fell into an elaborate trap involving them being framed in a chemical weapon hoax.

    Who were the extra flights for on 5 March? When was Yulia supposed to be going home?

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