UK TO CONTINUE TO RESPOND ‘ROBUSTLY’ TO RUSSIA’S THREAT

Tue 21 September 2021:

After the UK police accused a third Russian suspect in the Salisbury poisoning attack, Priti Patel, the UK interior minister, launched on a furious rant against Russia.

Patel said the United Kingdom “will continue to respond extremely robustly to the enduring and significant threat from the Russian state.”

The UK Counter Terrorism Policing network had reported earlier in the day that the third suspect in the Salisbury poisoning attack on former Russian military intelligence officer Sergei Skripal and his daughter, Yulia, in 2018 had been charged. The suspect is a member of the Russian military intelligence service, according to reports.

“We continue to make huge strides to counter this threat and to increase our resilience and that of our allies to Russian malign activity,” Patel told Parliament.

The home secretary said that since that this is an ongoing investigation, she was limited in terms of what can be said about these three individuals, but stressed that the UK government will do “whatever is necessary” to keep the UK people safe.

Patel also accused Moscow of challenging the fundamental basis of international order, and claimed that the poisoning attempt against Skripals with a military nerve agent known as Novichok was not the first “brazen” attack Russia has committed in the UK, and noted that earlier on Tuesday the European Court of Human Rights had ruled that Russia was responsible for the assassination of ex-KGB officer Alexander Litvinenko in London in 2006.

The Russian government has denied the accusations numerous times, and on August 26, Russian Ambassador to the United Kingdom Andrei Kelin told the BBC that Moscow had sent 54 diplomatic notes to London requesting information about the alleged poisoning of Skripal and his daughter, but that requests had gone unanswered.

Photo: Sergei Skripal, 66, and his daughter Yulia, 33, were found unconscious but both survived the attack

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