Russian President Vladimir Putin must have ordered the Novichok nerve agent attack on Russian double agent Sergei Skripal in 2018, in a “reckless” display of power that led to the death of an innocent woman, a UK public inquiry concluded on Thursday.
Skripal was found along with his daughter Yulia slumped unconscious on a public bench in the southern English city of Salisbury in March 2018 after Novichok was applied to the front door handle of his nearby home.
About four months later, mother-of-three Dawn Sturgess, 44, died from exposure to the poison after her partner found a counterfeit perfume bottle which Russian spies had used to smuggle the military-grade nerve agent into the country, the inquiry said.
‘Overwhelming evidence’
The Skripals, and a police officer who went to Skripal’s house, were left critically ill from its effects, but recovered.
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In his conclusions, the chair, former UK Supreme Court judge Anthony Hughes, said he was certain a team of GRU military intelligence officers had attempted to murder Skripal, who sold Russian secrets to Britain and moved there after a 2010 spy swap.
“I have concluded that the operation to assassinate Sergei Skripal must have been authorised at the highest level, by President Putin,” Hughes said in his report.
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“The evidence that this was a Russian state attack is overwhelming.”
Russia has always denied any involvement, casting the accusations as anti-Russian propaganda. The Russian embassy in London did not respond immediately to a request for comment.