According to
Naryshkin, "even if one assumed that some secret service had really been
given such a task, the way it went about that business was very
unprofessional".
MOSCOW, October 2.
/TASS/. The director of Russia’s foreign intelligence SVR, Sergei Naryshkin,
believes that the Skripal case was a crude provocation.
"Even if one assumes
that some secret service was really given such a task, the way it went about
this business was very unprofessional. I can say once again that it was a crude
provocation," Naryshkin said at a presentation of the two-volume edition A
History of Crimea at TASS, when asked for comment on the Skripal saga.
If the British
version is to be believed, former GRU Colonel Sergei Skripal and his daughter
Yulia on March 4 were affected by a Novichok class nerve agent applied to the
handle of the door of their home in Salisbury. London claimed that Moscow was
highly likely involved in this incident. Moscow strongly dismissed all
speculations on that score, saying that no programs for making such a substance
had ever existed in the former Soviet Union or Russia.
On September 5,
British Prime Minister Theresa May briefed parliament on the investigation’s
findings to declare that two Russians carrying passports issued in the names of
Alexander Petrov and Ruslan Boshirov were suspected accomplices in the
assassination attempt. Britain regards both men as GRU agents. Petrov and
Boshirov in an interview to the RT television channel dismissed the charges.
The Daily Telegraph
last Thursday claimed it knew the real name of the person suspected of the
assassination attempt against the Skripals. The newspaper said that the man
originally identified as Ruslan Boshirov was in reality Russian Colonel Anatoly
Chepiga, a holder of several government awards.
Source: ITAR-TASS
02-10-2018
