MOSCOW (Reuters) - Britain’s ambassador to Moscow will skip a Russian Foreign Ministry briefing on the poisoning of former Russian double agent Sergei Skripal and his daughter in Britain, an embassy spokesman said on Wednesday.

The Foreign Ministry has invited foreign ambassadors to attend a meeting with arms control experts later on Wednesday to discuss British allegations that Moscow was responsible for the poisoning in southern England, something Russia denies.

“The ambassador will not attend and we are considering whether to send a representative at working level,” the embassy spokesman said.

Speaking on a visit to Japan, Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said earlier on Wednesday that Russia wanted Britain to tell it where Skripal and his daughter, Yulia, were currently located.

Lavrov said Moscow also wanted to know why the British government had accused Russia of responsibility when the police investigation into the Salisbury incident was incomplete.

“Overall there is no doubt that the current British leadership has consciously taken a course to undermine Russian-British relations,” Lavrov said at a news conference with his Japanese counterpart Taro Kono in Tokyo.

“If this will continue in the form of any tangible new anti-Russian actions then of course nobody has cancelled the principle of reciprocity. It would be good for everyone and for (the British government) if they stopped getting agitated and calmed down.”</s>The U.S. ambassador to Russia Jon Huntsman will skip a special Russian briefing on the poisoning of former Russian double agent Sergei Skripal and his

 daughter in Britain, Russian news agencies reported, citing the

 U.S. embassy in Moscow.

 

 The Russian Foreign Ministry has invited foreign ambassadors to attend a meeting with arms control experts later on Wednesday to discuss British allegations that Moscow was responsible for the poisoning in southern England, something Russia denies.

 

 Britain's ambassador in Moscow is not attending the event either.</s>MOSCOW (AP) — Russia said Friday that it will expel British diplomats and halt high-level meetings with the U.K. in an increasingly global standoff over the nerve agent attack on an ex-spy — but still isn’t saying who will be kicked out or when.

President Vladimir Putin’s spokesman said to expect a Russian response “shortly” to Britain’s expulsion of Russian diplomats and accused Britain of violating international law and “common sense.” Russia’s foreign minister said Britain’s defense minister “lacks education.”

Geopolitical tensions are mounting since the poisoning of ex-spy Sergei Skripal and his daughter in the English city of Salisbury earlier this month, in what Western powers see as the latest sign of increasingly aggressive Russian meddling abroad. The tensions threaten to overshadow Putin’s expected re-election Sunday for another six-year term.

“We have never encountered this level of discussion on the global stage,” Putin spokesman Dmitry Peskov told reporters, saying he’s been surprised by the British reaction.

Accusing the Russian state of the nerve agent attack, Britain is expelling 23 Russian diplomats and is trying to build a coalition of countries to punish Moscow as a result.

British Prime Minister Theresa May’s office said that Australian leader Malcolm Turnbull joined her in condemnation of the attack. In an unusual joint move Wednesday, the U.S., France and Germany also pointed the finger at Russia.

The source of the nerve agent used — which Britain says is Soviet-made Novichok — is unclear. A report in the Telegraph says it was put in the suitcase of Skripal’s daughter before she left Russia for Britain to see her father.

Russia denies being the source of the nerve agent, suggesting it could have been another country, and has demanded Britain share samples collected by investigators.

Russia’s envoy at the international chemical weapons watchdog says the nerve agent used could have come from U.S. or British stockpiles. Alexander Shulgin, Russia’s envoy at the Hague-based Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons, said in televised remarks that Britain and the United States both had the nerve agent used.

An 83-year-old Russian whistleblower who helped develop Novichok said in an interview published Friday that a few countries in the world have laboratories powerful enough to develop the nerve agent thanks to a formula he published in 2008.

Vil Mirzayanov, who now lives in New Jersey, is quoted in Novaya Gazeta as saying it’s unlikely the nerve agent came from another former Soviet country as Russians have suggested. Mirzayanov said he revealed the existence of Novichok because he thought it was necessary to deprive Russia of its “deadly secret.”

He also said he thinks the Skripals, who are in critical condition, have little chance of surviving.

Lavrov said Friday that Russia will “of course” expel British diplomats and that he hopes the Skripals recover soon so light can be shed on what happened.

May severed high-level contacts with Moscow and vowed actions against Russian dirty money and “hostile state activity.” Downing Street called the attack “an unlawful use of force’ by the Russians against the U.K.”

Russia’s ambassador to Britain said Friday the 23 expulsions will reduce staff at the embassy by about 40 percent. Alexander Yakovenko said on Russia-24 television it will have a “serious impact” on the embassy’s work.

The war of words between Moscow and London continued Friday, with Lavrov lashing back at British Defense Secretary Gavin Williamson for saying Russia “should go away and shut up.”

“Perhaps he also wants to go down in history with some loud statements. … I don’t know, perhaps he lacks education,” Lavrov told a news conference after talks on Syria’s war with his Iranian and Turkish counterparts.

The leader of Britain’s main opposition party says the government shouldn’t rush to blame Moscow for the nerve agent poisoning of a former spy. Labour Party leader Jeremy Corbyn said in a newspaper column that politicians must not “rush way ahead of the evidence being gathered by the police.” Corbyn said in the Guardian that it’s possible that “Russian mafia-like groups,” rather than the Russian state, were responsible.

Danica Kirka reported from London. Jill Lawless in London, and Vladimir Isachenkov and Nataliya Vasilyeva in Moscow, contributed to this report.

Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov speaks to Federal Security Service (FSB) Director Alexander Bortnikov as they attend a security council meeting in the Kremlin in Moscow, Russia, Thursday, March 15, 2018. Lavrov said Thursday that Moscow would "certainly" expel some British diplomats in a tit-for-tat response. In remarks carried by the RIA Novosti news agency, Lavrov said the move would come "soon." (Mikhail Klimentyev, Sputnik, Kremlin Pool Photo via AP) Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov speaks to Federal Security Service (FSB) Director Alexander Bortnikov as they attend a security council meeting in the Kremlin in Moscow, Russia, Thursday, March 15, 2018. Lavrov said Thursday that Moscow would "certainly" expel some British diplomats in a tit-for-tat response. In remarks carried by the RIA Novosti news agency, Lavrov said the move would come "soon." (Mikhail Klimentyev, Sputnik, Kremlin Pool Photo via AP) FILE – In this Tuesday, March 13, 2018 file photo, Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov gestures during a meeting with South Korean head of National Security Chung Eui-yong at the Russian foreign ministry in Moscow, Russia. Lavrov says Russia will kick out British diplomats in a worsening standoff over a nerve agent attack, but still isn’t saying when or how many. (AP Photo/Alexander Zemlianichenko, File) FILE – In this Tuesday, March 13, 2018 file photo, Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov gestures during a meeting with South Korean head of National Security Chung Eui-yong at the Russian foreign ministry in Moscow, Russia. Lavrov says Russia will kick out British diplomats in a worsening standoff over a nerve agent attack, but still isn’t saying when or how many. (AP Photo/Alexander Zemlianichenko, File) Britain’s Prime Minister Theresa May speaks to members of military as she visits Salisbury southwest England, Thursday March 15, 2018 . may was in Salisbury view the area of Sunday’s suspected nerve agent attack on Russian double agent Sergei Skripal and his daughter Yulia. (Toby Melville, Pool via AP) Britain’s Prime Minister Theresa May speaks to members of military as she visits Salisbury southwest England, Thursday March 15, 2018 . may was in Salisbury view the area of Sunday’s suspected nerve agent attack on Russian double agent Sergei Skripal and his daughter Yulia. (Toby Melville, Pool via AP)</s>Senior Russian diplomatic and military officials have accused the UK of hiding and possibly planning to destroy evidence in the investigation into the Salisbury nerve agent attack.

The comments came during a remarkable briefing at Moscow’s foreign ministry given for all foreign ambassadors in Russia, to lay out the country’s argument for why it is not responsible for the attack on former double agent Sergei Skripal and his daughter, Yulia, on 4 March.

Britain says they were poisoned with a nerve agent known as novichok and has blamed Russia for the attack, but Moscow has fiercely denied any involvement. The case has prompted the two countries to expel diplomats in a tit-for-tat dispute.

Speaking to a lecture hall of diplomats, Vladimir Yermakov, deputy head of the ministry’s department for non-proliferation, suggested that the UK was “hiding facts” about the case that may later “disappear”.



Laurie Bristow, the British ambassador to Russia, did not attend and the ambassadors of other major allies, including the US, Germany and France, also boycotted the briefing.

But one British diplomat did go. Emma Nottingham condemned the “disinformation” coming from the Russian government during the briefing, which was closed to the press but streamed live online.

Spy poisoning: police say investigation could last until summer Read more

“Russia has offered us so far no explanation of how this agent came to be used in the United Kingdom and no explanation as to why Russia has an undeclared chemical weapons programme in contravention of international law,” Nottingham told the five-person panel.

“We are not obliged to give anything to Great Britain,” Yermakov replied to Nottingham. “It is an attack on Russian citizens on the territory of Great Britain, so why don’t we carry out a joint investigation?”

Yermakov also suggested that Russia may not accept the conclusions of an investigation by the Organisation for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons as fact.

“It is not possible to evaluate what happened in Salisbury within the framework of the convention and within the Organisation for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons,” he said in remarks translated by Interfax. “Deeper expert evaluations will be needed, and in any case we need to conduct our own investigations for Russia to be able to draw any conclusions.”

The briefing lasted just under two hours.</s>MOSCOW, March 21 (Reuters) - Britain's ambassador to Moscow will skip a Russian Foreign Ministry briefing on the poisoning of former Russian double agent Sergei Skripal and his daughter in Britain, an embassy spokesman said on Wednesday.

The Foreign Ministry has invited foreign ambassadors to attend a meeting with arms control experts later on Wednesday to discuss British allegations that Moscow was responsible for the poisoning in southern England, something Russia denies.

"The ambassador will not attend and we are considering whether to send a representative at working level," the embassy spokesman said.

Speaking on a visit to Japan, Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said earlier on Wednesday that Russia wanted Britain to tell it where Skripal and his daughter, Yulia, were currently located.

Lavrov said Moscow also wanted to know why the British government had accused Russia of responsibility when the police investigation into the Salisbury incident was incomplete.

"Overall there is no doubt that the current British leadership has consciously taken a course to undermine Russian-British relations," Lavrov said at a news conference with his Japanese counterpart Taro Kono in Tokyo.

"If this will continue in the form of any tangible new anti-Russian actions then of course nobody has cancelled the principle of reciprocity. It would be good for everyone and for (the British government) if they stopped getting agitated and calmed down." (Reporting by Andrew Osborn, Maria Kiselyova and Denis Pinchuk Writing by Andrew Osborn Editing by)</s>MOSCOW (Reuters) - Russia does not rule out ordering the United States to cut its diplomatic staff in Russia to 300 people or fewer, RIA news agency quoted senior Foreign Ministry official Georgy Borisenko as saying on Wednesday.

In July, Moscow told the United States to slash the number of its diplomatic and technical staff working in Russia by around 60 percent, to 455, in a further sign of souring relations. 

 The figure of 455 was meant to mirror the total number of Russian diplomats working in the United States, but also included Russian nationals working at the United Nations in New York, Borisenko, head of the Foreign Ministry's North America Department, told RIA.

 "The fact that in the summer we took into account the people working for Russia's mission at the U.N., this was good will," Borisenko said. 

 "If they haven't appreciated this, we have the full right to reduce ... the number of U.S. diplomats," he said, adding that Moscow could stop taking Russian U.N. staff into account when calculating what parity between the two countries meant.

 "In this case, the number of American personnel in Russia should decline to a level of 300 or below."

 A spokeswoman for the U.S. Embassy in Moscow said Washington hoped that complying with the Russian requirements would mean both countries could stop trading retaliatory measures, RIA later reported.

 "The deterioration of relations does not serve the interests of either side. We hope that the downward trend in relations has come to an end," RIA quoted embassy spokeswoman Maria Olson as saying. 

 

 (Reporting by Maria Kiselyova; Writing by Dmitry Solovyov; Editing by Andrew Osborn/Mark Heinrich)</s>Rachel is a Verdict reporter covering global business, finance, and politics. You can reach her at rachel.dobbs@verdict.co.uk

The Russian Ambassador to the United Kingdom has told the press that the attack on former double-agent Sergei Skripal is “so complicated…we need the wisdom of Hercule Poirot to solve the mystery”.

Alexander Yakovenko went on the offensive today at a press conference in London, after 23 Russian diplomats were expelled from the country following the poisoning of Sergei Skripal, a former double agent, with the nerve agent novichok.

Yakovenko hit back at British allegations that Moscow was behind the attack, saying that Britain has provided no proof of this and that all has been seen is a “hysterical newspaper campaign”.

He suggested that the United Kingdom:
• Had stores of the nerve agent prior to the attack; refused Russia access to their citizen Yulia Skripal
• Deliberately withheld information on the investigation into the attack from Russian authorities
• Ignored Russian requests for details on the recent murder of Russian businessman Nikolai Glushkov

Yakovenko repeatedly stated that Russia had nothing to do with the attack, which he called “a horrible act, the poisoning of the Russian people”.

Yakovenko also said that the United Kingdom has a “bad record of violating international law and misleading the international community” including invading Yugoslavia, Iraq and Libya under false pretenses and supporting a coup in the Ukraine.

Yakovenko went on to say that the expulsion of Russian diplomats constituted a violation by the British Government of its obligations under the Vienna Convention on Consular Relations.

He also refused to commit Russia to accepting the verdict of the Organisation for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW), who are investigating the nerve agent. Instead he said that he would listen to their findings, and then might ask for more evidence.

The ambassador attacked Foreign Secretary Boris Johnson for his comments yesterday, likening the World Cup in Russia to Hitler hosting the Olympics in 1936.

Asked if he would resign if Russia was found to be responsible for the Skripal attack, Yakovenko dodged the question, instead responding with a list of questions Russia had for the UK.

He said Russia still didn’t know:
• What hospital Sergei and Yulia Skripal were in and and what their condition was?
• Why the policeman who was also exposed to the nerve agent was recovering and they were not?
• Did the Skripals receive an antidote? (Yakovenko later clarified that the Russians assumed the Skripals had an antidote because they assessed that, without one, they would be dead).
• What exposure did medical staff have to the nerve agent and, if it was not dangerous for them, why could consular staff not visit them too?

Yakovenko also stated that he found it “extraordinary” that British MPs were encouraging cyberwarfare against Russia, and suggested that the response was the result of Britain trying to find a new role in the world after Brexit.

In a cross-over with the other main news story of the last fortnight, Yakovenko denied any Russian contact with Cambridge Analytica, after Channel 4 News anchor Jon Snow asked about a photo showing Yakovenko with the data-communications CEO at a polo match.</s>MOSCOW (Reuters) - Britain accused Moscow on Wednesday of running an assassination program to eliminate its enemies, while Russia said Britain may itself have orchestrated the poisoning of former Russian double agent Sergei Skripal and his daughter Yulia in England.

 In remarkable scenes at a Russian Foreign Ministry event in Moscow attended by dozens of foreign diplomats and broadcast on state TV, the two sides launched sharp allegations against each other over the nerve agent attack. 

 The attack in Salisbury, England, has plunged ties between London and Moscow into their worst crisis since the Cold War. Britain has blamed Russia for the attack - something Moscow denies - and both have expelled diplomats in the standoff.

 Russia had organized Wednesday's event to explain its stance and lost little time in alleging that Britain itself had either directly or indirectly orchestrated the attack or had allowed "a terrorist attack" to take place on British soil.

 "Nobody understands what happened in Salisbury," Vladimir Yermakov, a diplomat who chaired the event, told foreign diplomats. "Let's investigate what really happened." 

 His own view, he said, was that the poisoning had been a pre-planned action designed to harm Russia.

 Emma Nottingham, a British diplomat, countered that London had concluded it was "highly likely" that Moscow stood behind the attempted assassination of the Skripals for four reasons:

 "The identification of the chemical agent by our world leading scientists, our knowledge that Russia has previously produced this agent ... Russia's record in conducting state-sponsored assassinations ... and our assessment that Russia views defectors as legitimate targets."

 Many ambassadors including those of Britain, France, Germany and the United States, stayed away from the Moscow event, sending more junior officials instead.

 But key Western countries criticized Russia and offered Britain their support. Some others, including Sweden and the Czech Republic, publicly complained about Russian accusations that their countries might have been the origin of the nerve agent used in the Salisbury attack.

 Skripal, a former colonel in Russian GRU military intelligence who betrayed dozens of Russian agents to British intelligence, and his daughter Yulia have been critically ill since March 4, when they were found unconscious on a public bench in the English cathedral city.

 Skripal took refuge in England after being released by Moscow in a spy swap deal involving the exchange of some Russian spies held in the West.

 

 'ISLAND MENTALITY' 

 Britain says a military-grade nerve agent called Novichok, first developed by the Soviet Union, had been used in the attack. 

 But Nottingham said Russia had failed to explain how the nerve agent used in the attack had got from Russia to England and why it was running an illegal chemical weapons program. 

 "Instead, what we've seen is a barrage of distortion and disinformation ... and attempts to confuse the facts." 

 Yermakov said Russia did not understand what was going in British officials' heads. Talk of the Novichok nerve agent was like something out of a British TV series, he said.

 "Aren't you ashamed of yourself ?," Yermakov asked Nottingham. "Pull yourselves away a little bit from your Russophobia and your island mentality." 

 He said Moscow had nothing to do with the tragedy and wanted a wider investigation which, he said, meant London should share information and cooperate with Moscow.

 Speaking on a visit to Japan, Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said Russia wanted Britain to tell it where the Skripals were currently located.

 Lavrov said Moscow also wanted to know why the British government had accused Russia of responsibility when the police investigation into the Salisbury incident was incomplete.

 "Overall there is no doubt that the current British leadership has consciously taken a course to undermine Russian-British relations," Lavrov said at a news conference with his Japanese counterpart Taro Kono in Tokyo, according to a transcript on the Russian foreign ministry website.

 "If this will continue in the form of any tangible new anti-Russian actions then of course nobody has canceled the principle of reciprocity. It would be good for everyone and for (the British government) if they stopped getting agitated and calmed down."

 

 (Additional reporting by Denis Pinchuk; Editing by Richard Balmforth)</s>Britain has held back from an immediate escalation of the round of tit-for-tat reprisals with Russia in the wake of the Salisbury poison attack.

But Prime Minister Theresa May told a meeting of the National Security Council (NSC) that further measures were under active consideration and she was ready to deploy them “at any time”.

There had been speculation that the NSC might agree new retaliatory measures, after Moscow’s response to the UK’s first round of sanctions went further than Mrs May’s expulsion of 23 suspected spies from the Russian embassy.

As well as throwing out 23 UK diplomats, Moscow ordered the British Council to cease activities in Russia and withdrew permission for the reopening of the St Petersburg consulate.

The Russian “undeclared intelligence officers” left the country’s consulate on Tuesday, six days after Mrs May gave them a week to pack their bags and leave the UK.

A procession of vehicles took a number of individuals away from the gated Kensington Palace Gardens complex close to the Russian Embassy in west London.

Children, suitcases, bags and pet baskets were loaded into the three cars, five people carriers and three small-sized coaches which left the west London complex shortly after 10am.

The NSC meeting heard that action had been taken over the past week to tighten checks on private flights coming into the UK and to prepare legislation which will allow the authorities to target the assets of foreign nationals linked to human rights abuses.

“The Prime Minister reiterated that we will freeze Russian state assets wherever we have the evidence that they may be used to threaten the life of property of UK nationals or residents,” said the PM’s spokesman.

“And – led by the National Crime Agency – we will continue to bring all the capabilities of UK law enforcement to bear against serious criminals and corrupt elites.

“The Prime Minister said that there are other measures the Government and security officials are actively considering and stand ready to deploy at any time.”

The spokesman declined to comment on the decision of the president of the European Commission, Jean-Claude Juncker, to write to Mr Putin to congratulate him on his re-election as president.

Without mentioning the March 4 nerve agent attack which has left ex-spy Sergei Skripal and his daughter Yulia in a critical condition in hospital and injured a policeman who came to their aid, Mr Juncker called in his letter for “positive relations” between the EU and Russia.

Meanwhile, Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn has said he would still do business with Mr Putin despite “all fingers” pointing towards Russia being responsible for the Salisbury spy incident.

He told Radio 4’s World At One: “All fingers point towards Russia’s involvement in this, and obviously the manufacture of the material was undertaken by the Russian state originally.

“What I’m saying is the weapons were made from Russia, clearly.

“I think Russia has to be held responsible for it but there has to be an absolutely definitive answer to the question where did the nerve agent come from? I asked the Russians be given a sample so that they can say categorically one way or the other.”

Mr Skripal, a former double agent, and his daughter are still fighting for their lives after being exposed to Novichok in the Wiltshire city.

Mr Corbyn maintained there had to be a relationship with Russia and said he would still “do business” with president Putin if Labour came into power.

“Would I do business with Putin? Sure. And I’d challenge him on human rights in Russia, challenge him on these issues and challenge him on that whole basis of that relationship,” he told the BBC.

Foreign Secretary Boris Johnson accused Russia of trying to conceal “the needle of truth in a haystack of lies” over the case – after Mr Putin dismissed the idea of Russian responsibility as “nonsense”.

Writing in the Daily Telegraph, the Foreign Secretary said the use of a nerve agent against the Skripals was “very deliberate”.

“As Ken Clarke pointed out in Parliament last week, the obvious Russian-ness of the weapon was designed to send a signal to anyone pondering dissent amid the intensifying repression of Mr Putin’s Russia,” he wrote.

“The message is clear: we will hunt you down, we will find you and we will kill you – and though we will scornfully deny our guilt, the world will know that Russia did it.”</s>Vladimir Yermakov, the Russian foreign ministry head of non-proliferation, held a “briefing” for foreign diplomats in Moscow during which he questioned whether the incident, which left former Russian double agent Sergei Skripal, 66, and his daughter, Yulia, 33, fighting for their lives even involved a nerve agent. But his briefing was interrupted when British diplomat Emma Nottingham said there had been “a barrage of distortion and misinformation” as well as “an unlawful use of force against the United Kingdom.” Mr Yermakov fired back: “Get yourself out of your Russophobia and your island mentality. I feel ashamed for you.” The Russian Foreign Ministry event in Moscow was attended by dozens of foreign diplomats and broadcast on state TV.

But the two sides launched sharp allegations against each other over the nerve agent attack. The attack in Salisbury, England, has plunged ties between London and Moscow into their worst crisis since the Cold War. Britain has blamed Russia for the attack - something Moscow denies - and both have expelled diplomats in the standoff. Russia had organised Wednesday's event to explain its stance and lost little time in alleging that Britain itself had either directly or indirectly orchestrated the attack or had allowed "a terrorist attack" to take place on British soil.

Mr Yermakov added: “Nobody understands what happened in Salisbury. Let's investigate what really happened." However, Ms Nottingham said it was "highly likely" that Moscow stood behind the attempted assassination of the Skripals for four reasons: "The identification of the chemical agent by our world leading scientists, our knowledge that Russia has previously produced this agent ... Russia's record in conducting state-sponsored assassinations ... and our assessment that Russia views defectors as legitimate targets." Many ambassadors including those of Britain, France, Germany and the United States, stayed away from the Moscow event, sending more junior officials instead. US President Donald Trump and French President Emmanuel Macron reiterated solidarity with Britain in a telephone call on Wednesday and "agreed on the need to take action to hold Russia accountable", the White House said.
Russia holds a briefing on the case for all foreign diplomats in Moscow, where it accuses the United Kingdom of "withholding evidence."