Russia is intensifying its efforts to discredit Britain’s investigation into the poisoning of a former double agent in Salisbury, claiming most countries don’t believe the U.K.’s allegations Russia was involved and demanding the United Nations Security Council reject the claims.

“The majority of the world, the world community, is not supporting the Western approach,” Russia’s ambassador to Britain, Alexander Yakovenko, said Thursday during a lengthy news conference to denounce Britain. “We want to know the truth. … we have a lot of suspicions about Britain, you know.”

The poisoning of former spy Sergei Skripal and his daughter, Yulia, has prompted a global diplomatic standoff and driven relations between Russia and the West to their lowest point in decades. British investigators have insisted the Skripals were exposed to Novichok, a deadly group of poisons developed in the Soviet Union during the 1980s. Prime Minister Theresa May has said Russia was likely involved in the plot and she has been backed by the European Union, the United States, Canada and around 20 other Western allies. In a show of solidarity, Britain and its allies have expelled more than 150 Russian diplomats. Russia has responded by expelling a similar number of Western diplomats.

However, Britain’s case has been thrown into confusion this week amid reports that Gary Aitkenhead, the head of the laboratory examining the poison, said he was unable to verify that the nerve agent had come from Russia. There were also allegations Britain’s Foreign Office deleted an official tweet this week that said the nerve agent had been produced in Russia.

And the plot thickened further on Thursday when Ms. Skripal, 33, issued a statement saying her recovery was going well. “I woke up over a week ago now and am glad to say my strength is growing daily,” said the statement. After thanking hospital staff in Salisbury, she added, “I am sure you appreciate that the entire episode is somewhat disorientating.”

There were also reports in Russia on Thursday that Ms. Skripal had called her cousin, Viktoria Skripal, in Moscow and told her, “Everything’s okay, everything’s fine.” Ms. Skripal also allegedly told her cousin that Britain probably wouldn’t give Viktoria a visa to come and visit her. Viktoria has also told the media that she is not convinced by Britain’s account of what happened and she believes a former boyfriend of Yulia’s could be behind the attack. Mr. Skripal, 66, remains in critical condition.

Russian officials have seized on the confusion and launched a counterattack, saying Britain has not produced any evidence to back up its claim and that Britain has refused to share any information about the case. Mr. Yakovenko held a briefing this week in London with ambassadors from dozens of other countries and on Thursday he spent more than two hours with reporters outlining Russia’s case. The Russian embassy is also involved in Viktoria Skripal’s planned visit to London, offering accommodation, transportation and interpreters. And on Thursday, Russia requested a special meeting of the UN Security Council to discuss Britain’s accusations.

During Thursday’s news conference, Mr. Yakovenko struck a confident tone, smiling frequently and even joking at times. “Every day is a new story. Every day is a new version,” he said referring to the lack of information about the case. “We want to know what happened here … This is not a game. For us, it is not a joke, believe me. These citizens are poisoned and we want to know the truth.”

He insisted that Russia had never produced Novichok. “The whole story about Novichok started in the United States in the 1990s,” he said. “It has nothing to do with Russia, we never produced it. We never had Novichok. This is the creation of some other countries.” He added that Britain has made the allegations to divert attention away from Brexit and to take the lead in growing Western attacks on Russia. And he said Russia has been concerned about the number of Russians who have died in the U.K. over the years. “If you take the, let’s say, last 10 years, so many Russian citizens died here in the U.K. under very strange circumstances. … My question is, ‘Why is it happening here?’”

The Organisation for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons has been called in to investigate the poisoning and its first results are expected next week. On Wednesday, Russia lost a vote at the organization for it to be involved in a joint investigation with Britain. The vote went 6-15 against Russia’s request but 17 nations abstained, providing something of a boost to Russia. Mr. Yakovenko said the abstentions proved that a majority of countries were not prepared to back Britain and that the only allies the U.K. has are primarily EU and NATO member states. He added that Russia will accept the OPCW’s findings but only if its work is fully transparent.

British Foreign Secretary Boris Johnson has stuck by Britain’s allegations, saying the Russians are trying to “obscure the truth and confuse the public.” In a statement, he said, “It seems Russia will never accept the legitimacy of any investigation into chemical weapons use unless it comes up with an answer Russia likes.”</s>LONDON (NYTIMES) - Russian television broadcast a telephone recording on Thursday (April 5) said to be of Ms Yulia Skripal, who was poisoned with a military-grade nerve agent a month ago and is at the centre of an escalating confrontation between Russia and Britain.

In the recording, which the Rossiya 24 news announcer emphasised could not be verified, Ms Skripal tells her cousin Viktoria that both she and her father, Mr Sergei V. Skripal, are healthy, and that neither of them has suffered long-term health damage from the poisoning.

The recording contradicted public statements by British authorities, who have described Mr Sergei Skripal's condition as "critical but stable", and said that only Ms Yulia Skripal was conscious.

Within hours of the programme's broadcast, British police released a statement on Ms Yulia Skripal's behalf, in which she said she "woke up over a week ago now" and that her "strength is growing daily".

The two accounts underline a challenge Britain is facing as it endeavours to build and maintain an international coalition around the poisoning while keeping much of its evidence secret.

Authorities have released little information about the attack on Mr Sergei Skripal and his daughter, but they have expressed certainty that it was carried out on behalf of the Russian government.

Officials have said Mr Sergei Skripal, a former Russian spy turned double agent who was living peacefully in southwestern England, was very likely targeted as an example to future defectors.

Moscow has denied the accusations and has seized on the ambiguities surrounding the investigation in an aggressive campaign to discredit British authorities.

At the United Nations on Thursday, the Russian ambassador, Mr Vasily Nebenzya, called an emergency session of the Security Council where he accused British authorities of everything from planting false stories in the media to neglecting Mr Sergei Skripal's pet cats and guinea pigs.

He gave an impromptu lecture about Dostoyevsky's "Crime and Punishment" and quoted at length from "Alice in Wonderland".

"This is some kind of theatre of the absurd," he said. "What, you were unable to find a more believable fake?"

Britain's public case against Russia has so far rested largely on the nerve agent, an unusual chemical weapon developed in the last years of the Soviet Union.

But this week, the chief executive of the Defence Science and Technology Laboratory at Porton Down, Britain's premier chemical weapons laboratory, said its scientists could not identify "the precise source" of the chemical, though it was almost certainly created by a "state actor".

That conclusion undercut statements by Foreign Secretary Boris Johnson that Porton Down scientists had "categorically" traced the agent to Russia.

Mr Johnson swiftly came under criticism from Mr Jeremy Corbyn, leader of the opposition Labour Party, who said the Foreign Secretary had "exceeded the information he had been given" and had "egg on his face".

Ms Diane Abbott, another Labour leader, took aim at Mr Johnson in an interview with the BBC, saying, "so many people were willing to rush to the media and say it was unequivocally Putin."

"We will, I hope, get some credit for taking a more thoughtful approach and asking the right questions," she said.

At the Security Council, Britain's closest allies reiterated their support for the conclusion that Russia was behind the poisoning.

"We share the UK's assessment, namely that there is no other plausible explanation other than Russia's responsibility," said France's ambassador, Mr François Delattre.

His sentiments were echoed by the representatives from the United States, Sweden, the Netherlands and others.

In her remarks to the Security Council, Britain's ambassador, Ms Karen Pierce, responded calmly to the barrage of Russian accusations, providing what she described as "intellectual clarity".

About 250 police detectives are involved in the investigation, she said. They are reviewing 5,000 hours of surveillance video, examining 1,300 exhibits and interviewing 500 witnesses.

"The UK has launched one of the most comprehensive and complex investigations into the use of a chemical weapon ever," Ms Pierce said.

She also brought some of her own literary references. Responding to Mr Nebenzya, who a few weeks ago compared British investigators on the case to the hapless Inspector Lestrade from the Sherlock Holmes stories, Ms Pierce compared Russia to Holmes' nemesis, Professor Moriarty.

A new challenge could come within a few days if Ms Viktoria Skripal, Mr Sergei Skripal's niece, follows through on plans to travel to Britain.

Mr Alexander Yakovenko, the Russian ambassador in London, said at a news conference on Thursday that he had offered Ms Viktoria Skripal assistance with transport, accommodation and Russian-English translation during her visit.

Ms Viktoria Skripal has repeatedly expressed doubts about the British accusations, suggesting that her relatives could have been sickened by bad fish or attacked by the mother of Ms Yulia Skripal's boyfriend.

She has made several appearances on Russia's state-controlled television in recent days, in one case appearing alongside the two men accused of having poisoned Mr Alexander Litvinenko, another former Russian spy, in London in 2006.

In the conversation broadcast on Thursday on Russian television, Ms Yulia Skripal tells her cousin that she will probably not get a British visa and that they probably would be unable to see each other.</s>Karen Pierce, UK ambassador and permanent representative to the United Nations in New York, took aim at Russia via a Sherlock Holmes analogy after its failed attempt to have their scientists join the OPCW investigation. In a briefing to reporters ahead of the UN Security Council meeting, she said: "Allowing Russian scientists into an investigation when they are the most likely perpetrators of the crime in Salisbury would be like Scotland Yard inviting in Professor Moriarty, so I don't think that's a tenable way forward." Ms Pierce later said she feared the Russians are aiming to "build a narrative of how they won't accept the OPCW results" when they emerge, adding: "We as UK having nothing to hide, we look forward to the report - which will be given to us as the requesting state party. "We ask what have the Russians got to fear?" Her comments come as British Security Minister, Ben Wallace, insisted that it would soon be “beyond a reasonable doubt” that Moscow carried out the attack on Sergei Scripal, 66, and his daughter, Yulia, 33, on March 4.

Mr Wallace’s proclamation comes as Russia called for a meeting of the United Nations Security Council. Russia’s Foreign minister Sergey Lavrov said the UK has “legitimate questions” to answer about the nerve agent assault on the Skripals. But Mr Wallace said that the investigation’s “roads lead to Russia” as the UK sought to maintain diplomatic pressure on Moscow over the incident. Russia called a meeting of the Organisation for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW) in The Hague on Wednesday to insist its experts must be involved in the testing programme and probe. But it lost the vote after Britain told the extraordinary meeting the demand was a sign the federation was “nervous” of what the inquiries will find.

Russian officials speaking after the meeting concluded said they had presented a “common sense” case and pointed to the “lies by Tony Blair” over Iraq as they criticised the intelligence about the attack. But Mr Wallace told BBC Radio 4’s Today programme that comparisons to the flawed intelligence on weapons of mass destruction in Iraq were not valid. He said: “There’s no missing nerve agent that no-one can find – it was used in Salisbury, we had three people seriously ill, two obviously remain in hospital in critical condition, and there is no doubt that we have found nerve agent.” “That nerve agent has been identified to being manufactured we believe in Russia and we believe that the nerve agent, the Novichok type of nerve agent, is only capable of being produced by a nation state, and then we add that to intelligence we hold, we add that to some of the police investigation that’s going on right now, and we can say that roads lead to Russia, that we are beyond reasonable doubt of the view that the Russian state is behind this.”

Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn has also raised the subject of the “flawed intelligence and dodgy dossiers” behind the Iraq invasion in his response to the Skripal case. Mr Wallace said the Labour leader had seen more intelligence “than the average backbench MP” because he had received a Privy Council briefing on the matter – but added: “The circle of who gets to see very sensitive information is very small because if you leak it or it gets out, people’s lives are put at risk.” Foreign Secretary Boris Johnson – who has come under fire over his handling of the incident – has accused Mr Corbyn of siding with the “Russian spin machine”.</s>It is beyond reasonable doubt that Russia was behind the Salisbury attack, Security Minister Ben Wallace insisted as Moscow stepped up efforts to undermine the UK’s case.

Russia has called for a meeting of the United Nations Security Council and foreign minister Sergey Lavrov said the UK has “legitimate questions” to answer about the nerve agent assault on Sergei Skripal and his daughter Yulia.

But Mr Wallace said that the investigation’s “roads lead to Russia” as the UK sought to maintain diplomatic pressure on Moscow over the incident.

Russia called a meeting of the Organisation for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW) in The Hague on Wednesday to insist its experts must be involved in the testing programme and probe.

But it lost the vote after Britain told the extraordinary meeting the demand was a sign the federation was “nervous” of what the inquiries will find.

Russian officials speaking after the meeting concluded said they had presented a “common sense” case and pointed to the “lies by Tony Blair” over Iraq as they criticised the intelligence about the attack.

But Mr Wallace told BBC Radio 4’s Today programme that comparisons to the flawed intelligence on weapons of mass destruction in Iraq were not valid.

“There’s no missing nerve agent that no-one can find – it was used in Salisbury, we had three people seriously ill, two obviously remain in hospital in critical condition, and there is no doubt that we have found nerve agent,” he said.

[quote]That nerve agent has been identified to being manufactured we believe in Russia and we believe that the nerve agent, the Novichok type of nerve agent, is only capable of being produced by a nation state, and then we add that to intelligence we hold, we add that to some of the police investigation that’s going on right now, and we can say that roads lead to Russia, that we are beyond reasonable doubt of the view that the Russian state is behind this.[/quote]

Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn has also raised the subject of the “flawed intelligence and dodgy dossiers” behind the Iraq invasion in his response to the Skripal case.

Mr Wallace said the Labour leader had seen more intelligence “than the average backbench MP” because he had received a Privy Council briefing on the matter – but added: “The circle of who gets to see very sensitive information is very small because if you leak it or it gets out, people’s lives are put at risk.”

Foreign Secretary Boris Johnson – who has come under fire over his handling of the incident – has accused Mr Corbyn of siding with the “Russian spin machine”.

Moscow has asked for an open session of the UN Security Council to be held on Thursday at 8pm UK time.

Tension between Moscow and London has risen after the head of the Porton Down military research facility said scientists had not verified Russia as the source of the substance used in the attack on the Skripals.

Vladimir Putin seized on the comments from the chief executive of the Government’s Defence Science and Technology Laboratory (DSTL), Gary Aitkenhead, as he accused the UK of launching an “anti-Russian campaign”.

But UK security services have a high degree of confidence that they have pinpointed the location of the Russian laboratory that manufactured the nerve agent used in the attack, according to The Times.

A Whitehall source told the newspaper: “We knew pretty much by the time of the first Cobra (the emergency co-ordination briefing that took place the same week) that it was overwhelmingly likely to come from Russia.”

The Foreign Secretary, who has faced claims he exaggerated the evidence against Moscow, said countries around the world “continue to share our assessment” about the nerve agent attack.

He said: “The international community has yet again seen through these tactics and robustly defeated Russia’s attempts today to derail the proper international process.”

In the latest sign of the international storm created by the Salisbury attack, expelled US diplomats appeared to be leaving Moscow.

Russia last week ordered 60 American diplomats to leave the country by Thursday in retaliation for the United States expelling the same number of Russians.</s>'I woke up over a week ago now and am glad to say my strength is growing daily,' says Yulia Skripal

LONDON, United Kingdom – The Russian woman who was poisoned in Britain last month with her former spy father said Thursday, April 5, she was recovering, in her first public statement in a case that has sparked a major diplomatic crisis between Moscow and the West.

"I woke up over a week ago now and am glad to say my strength is growing daily," Yulia Skripal was quoted as saying in comments released by the police.

Britain blames Russia for the poisoning of Yulia and Sergei Skripal last month, but Moscow has furiously denied the charges.

Moscow issued a new broadside against Britain and its allies at the United Nations, warning British officials they were "playing with fire" by insisting Russia was behind the attack.

Yulia Skripal said she had found the incident "disorientating", without providing any further details on the attack in her short statement.

She and her father, a former double agent, were found in a critical condition on a public bench in the English city of Salisbury on March 4.

The crisis has led to a wave of tit-for-tat expulsions of diplomats between Moscow and the West.

Russian ambassador to the UN Vassily Nebenzia, told the council on Thursday that Britain and its allies were waging a "propaganda war" against Moscow.

"It's some sort of theatre of the absurd. Couldn't you come up with a better fake story?" he said. "We have told our British colleagues that 'you're playing with fire and you'll be sorry.'"

Russian state television earlier aired an unverified recording of a phone conversation between Yulia Skripal and her cousin who lives in Moscow.

In the call, a woman introducing herself as Yulia Skripal said she was expecting to be discharged from hospital soon and that her father Sergei was "fine".

The hospital where the pair are being treated said in their latest update last week that Sergei remained in a critical condition.

Russia's Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov Thursday complained that Britain had failed to provide "coherent answers" to Moscow's questions over the nerve agent attack.

"It will not be possible to ignore the legitimate questions we are asking," he warned hours before the UN meeting.

The Security Council "should look at this problem in every aspect and, I hope, objectively," Lavrov said.

Early Thursday, some 60 US diplomats who were ordered out of Russia left their embassy compound in Moscow.

Russia called a meeting of the global chemical watchdog on Wednesday, April 4, over the Salisbury incident, but failed in its bid to join the probe by the Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW).

President Vladimir Putin said on a visit to Ankara that "common sense" must prevail to avoid "this damage in international relations".

Moscow was unable to get the required two-thirds of votes from members to approve a joint investigation at Wednesday's OPCW meeting.

Facing off in The Hague

Wednesday's bid to secure a joint probe saw a day of bitter rhetoric between Moscow and Britain and its western allies.

"The purpose of Russia's ludicrous proposal at The Hague was clear – to undermine the independent, impartial work of the international chemical weapons watchdog," he said, adding that Moscow's main goal was "to obscure the truth and confuse the public."

Britain is carrying out its own probe, with independent technical assistance from OPCW experts.

Sergei Naryshkin, head of Russia's SVR foreign intelligence, warned that both sides must avoid tensions escalating to the dangerous levels of the Cold War.

He called the affair a "grotesque provocation... crudely concocted by the British and American security services."

OPCW experts have already taken on-site samples which are being analyzed in The Hague, as well as in 4 other certified laboratories. The watchdog said it expected the results by early next week.

But in a move hailed as a vindication by Moscow, the British defense laboratory analyzing the nerve agent revealed Tuesday, April 3, that it could not say whether the substance came from Russia.

The Kremlin immediately demanded an apology from Prime Minister Theresa May and her government for implicating Putin in the nerve agent attack, saying this "idiocy has gone too far."

On Thursday, The Times newspaper cited British security sources saying they believe they have pinpointed the location of a Russian laboratory where the nerve agent used in Salisbury was manufactured. – Rappler.com</s>Russia has called for the United Nations Security Council to meet on Thursday to discuss the Salisbury attack after it lost a bid to stage a joint investigation with the UK into the poisoning.

Boris Johnson has attacked Moscow for trying to “obscure the truth and confuse the public” about the nerve-agent assault on Sergei Skripal and his daughter Yulia.

Russia called a meeting of the Organisation for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW) in The Hague on Wednesday to insist its experts must be involved in the testing programme and probe.

But it lost the vote after Britain told the extraordinary meeting the demand was a sign the federation was “nervous” of what the inquiries will find.

Moscow has asked for an open session of the UN Security Council to be held on Thursday at 8pm UK time.

UK security services have high degree of confidence that they have pinpointed the location of the Russian laboratory that manufactured the nerve agent used in the attack, according to The Times.

A Whitehall source told the newspaper: “We knew pretty much by the time of the first Cobra (the emergency co-ordination briefing that took place the same week) that it was overwhelmingly likely to come from Russia.”

The Foreign Secretary, who has faced claims he exaggerated the evidence against Moscow, said countries around the world “continue to share our assessment” about the nerve-agent attack.

He said: “Russia has had one goal in mind since the attempted murders on UK soil through the use of a military-grade chemical weapon – to obscure the truth and confuse the public.

“The international community has yet again seen through these tactics and robustly defeated Russia’s attempts today to derail the proper international process.”

In a vote at OPCW, six of the 41 members backed Russia while 15 voted against, 17 abstained, two were absent, and one was not entitled to vote.

Nick Heath, deputy British ambassador to The Hague, said Russia had failed again in its attempts to “frustrate the process of justice”.

Russian officials speaking after the meeting concluded said they had presented a “common sense” case and pointed to the “lies by Tony Blair” over Iraq as they criticised the intelligence about the attack.

Russian deputy foreign minister Sergei Ryabkov told Russian news agency Tass said there is “no trust in Great Britain, it is impossible to trust London” after its continuous “misconduct” and the unacceptable rhetoric against Russia.

Tension between Moscow and London has risen a notch after the head of the Porton Down military research facility said scientists had not verified Russia as the source of the substance used in the attack on the Skripals.

Vladimir Putin seized on the comments from the chief executive of the Government’s Defence Science and Technology Laboratory (DSTL), Gary Aitkenhead, as he accused the UK of launching an “anti-Russian campaign”.

Mr Johnson attacked Jeremy Corbyn for “playing Russia’s game” after the Labour leader accused him of “exaggeration” over the evidence.

Former Foreign Secretary Sir Malcolm Rifkind said he did not think “any harm” has been done by Mr Johnson’s comments.

He told BBC Two’s Newsnight: “We are all familiar that Boris has a looser use of language. This is not the first time that’s happened.”</s>Russia has asked for a UN Security Council meeting over the poisoning of a former Russian double agent in Britain, the country's ambassador to the UN announced Wednesday.

Vassily Nebenzia said Russia was requesting a meeting Thursday at 1900 GMT over the British government's implication of Moscow in the nerve agent attack on former spy Sergei Skripal and his daughter Yulia.

Nebenzia said the council would soon receive a letter clarifying the Russian position.

The Kremlin has vehemently denied any involvement in the March 4 attack, which Britain says was carried out with a military-grade nerve agent developed by the Soviet Union.

On March 14, the council held an emergency meeting at the request of Britain over the row, which has triggered a wave of tit-for-tat diplomatic expulsions and inflamed tensions between Russia and Western governments.

A few days after the poisoning last month British Prime Minister Theresa May blamed Moscow, saying "there is no plausible alternative explanation."

Russia has claimed innocence from the beginning.

The British military facility analyzing the nerve agent used in the attack said Tuesday it was military-grade Novichok, a category of nerve agents developed by the Soviet Union.

However, it said it could not identify the precise source of the nerve agent.

A former colonel in the Russian military intelligence service, Skripal was accused of "high treason" in 2006 for selling information to Britain and sentenced to 13 years in prison.

In 2010, he was exchanged by Russia in a spy swap with Britain and the United States. Moscow received 10 Russian spies held by Washington for Skripal and three others.</s>The Russian woman who was poisoned in Britain last month with her former spy father said Thursday she was recovering, in her first public statement in a case that has sparked a major diplomatic crisis between Moscow and the West.

“I woke up over a week ago now and am glad to say my strength is growing daily,” Yulia Skripal was quoted as saying in comments released by the police.

The UN Security Council was due later Thursday to discuss the spiralling diplomatic crisis sparked by the poisoning of Yulia and Sergei Skripal.

Yulia Skripal said she had found the incident “disorientating”, without providing any further details on the attack in her short statement.

She and her father, a former double agent, were found in a critical condition on a public bench in the English city of Salisbury on March 4.

Britain blames Russia for incident, but Moscow has furiously denied the charges.

The crisis has led to a wave of tit-for-tat expulsions of diplomats between Moscow and the West.

Russia on Thursday demanded an “objective” probe into the case ahead of UN Security Council talks.

Russian state television earlier aired an unverified recording of a phone conversation between Yulia Skripal and her cousin who lives in Moscow.

In the call, a woman introducing herself as Yulia Skripal said she was expecting to be discharged from hospital soon and that her father Sergei was “fine”.

The hospital where the pair are being treated said in their latest update last week that Sergei remained in a critical condition.

Russia’s foreign minister Sergei Lavrov Thursday complained that Britain had failed to provide “coherent answers” to Moscow’s questions over the nerve agent attack.

“It will not be possible to ignore the legitimate questions we are asking,” he warned hours before the UN meeting.

The Security Council “should look at this problem in every aspect and, I hope, objectively,” Lavrov said.

Early Thursday morning some 60 US diplomats who were ordered out of Russia left their embassy compound in Moscow.

Russia called a meeting of the global chemical watchdog on Wednesday over the Salisbury incident, but failed in its bid to join the probe by the Organisation for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW).

Russia then requested the Security Council meeting on Thursday at 1900 GMT in New York.

Speaking in Moscow, Lavrov called for a “substantial and responsible” probe, while alleging the Skripal case was used by Britain as “a pretext, either made up or staged, for the groundless expulsions of Russian diplomats”.

President Vladimir Putin said on a visit to Ankara on Wednesday that “common sense” must prevail to avoid “this damage in international relations”.

Moscow was unable to get the required two-thirds of votes from members to approve a joint investigation at Wednesday’s OPCW meeting.

Russia’s UN ambassador Vasily Nebenzia said the meeting in New York would focus on a letter sent by British Prime Minister Theresa May which accused Moscow of carrying out the attempted assassination.

Facing off in The Hague

Wednesday’s bid to secure a joint probe saw a day of bitter rhetoric between Moscow and Britain and its western allies.

“The purpose of Russia’s ludicrous proposal at The Hague was clear -- to undermine the independent, impartial work of the international chemical weapons watchdog,” he said, adding that Moscow’s main goal was “to obscure the truth and confuse the public.”

Britain is carrying out its own probe, with independent technical assistance from OPCW experts.

Sergei Naryshkin, head of Russia’s SVR foreign intelligence, warned Wednesday that both sides must avoid tensions escalating to the dangerous levels of the Cold War.

He called the affair a “grotesque provocation ... crudely concocted by the British and American security services.”

OPCW experts have already taken on-site samples which are being analysed in The Hague, as well as in four other certified laboratories. The watchdog said it expected the results by early next week.

But in a move hailed as a vindication by Moscow, the British defence laboratory analysing the nerve agent revealed Tuesday that it could not say whether the substance came from Russia.

The Kremlin immediately demanded an apology from May and her government for implicating Putin in the nerve agent attack, saying this “idiocy has gone too far.”

On Thursday, The Times newspaper cited British security sources saying they believe they have pinpointed the location of a Russian laboratory where the nerve agent used in Salisbury was manufactured.</s>The source of a deadly poison has become an international flashpoint in the Skripal affair, though a new report says that U.K. authorities have known its Russian origin for weeks.

Investigators have said that the nerve agent Novichok was used to attack former Russian intelligence officer Sergei Skripal and his daughter Yulia last month at his home in Salisbury, the British town he settled in after a prison sentence for selling Moscow’s secrets.

Britain and a host of allies including the United States have blamed Russia for the poisoning, which has left the former spy in critical condition for more than a month, and collectively kicked out Kremlin diplomats.

Russian officials have repeatedly denied any involvement, and have seized on public confusion about Britain’s assessment that it knows the Novichuk flowed from the Motherland.

Daughter of former Russian spy is conscious after poison attack

Gary Aitkenhead, the head of the UK defense lab analyzing the poison, said that it was not in its purview to pinpoint the source, and that tests could not say the producer definitively.

The Russian Embassy in London seized on the fact that the diplomats at the British Foreign Office deleted an earlier tweet that said the lab “made clear that this was a military-grade Novichok nerve agent produced in Russia.”

A report in the Times of London, however, states that security services have been sure about the source of the poison since the days after the attack, when the first government security meeting was held.

Sources told the newspaper said that intelligence sources were used in addition to the scientific tests to determine the location, and that Russians had also conducted tests around using the chemicals for assassinations.

Russia has also complained that it has not been given consular access to one of its citizens, the recovering Yulia Skripal, as well as being shut out from the official investigation to what happened.

Britain’s representative to the United Nations’ Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons, which is producing a report on the matter with test results due next week, said that it would be “perverse” to make the victims engage with Russian investigators.

A Moscow proposal for a joint investigation was defeated at the OPCW office in the Netherlands on Wednesday, with only 6 people voting for it and 15 against.

Russia has also called a meeting of the UN Security Council in New York for Thursday.</s>This is an alleged image of the daughter of former Russian Spy Sergei Skripal, Yulia Skripal taken from Yulia Skipal's Facebook account on Tuesday March 6, 2018. British counterterrorism police said Tuesday that they are now leading the investigating into the unexplained illness of a former Russian spy Sergei Skripal and his daughter Yulia, although it hasn't been declared a terrorist incident. The Skripals were taken ill in Salisbury southwest England on Sunday. (Yulia Skripal/Facebook via AP)

The Russian woman who was poisoned in Britain last month with her former spy father said Thursday she was recovering, in her first public statement in a case that has sparked a major diplomatic crisis between Moscow and the West.

"I woke up over a week ago now and am glad to say my strength is growing daily," Yulia Skripal was quoted as saying in comments released by the police.

The UN Security Council was due later Thursday to discuss the spiralling diplomatic crisis sparked by the poisoning of Yulia and Sergei Skripal.

Yulia Skripal said she had found the incident "disorientating", without providing any further details on the attack in her short statement.

She and her father, a former double agent, were found in a critical condition on a public bench in the English city of Salisbury on March 4.

Britain blames Russia for incident, but Moscow has furiously denied the charges.

The crisis has led to a wave of tit-for-tat expulsions of diplomats between Moscow and the West.

Russia on Thursday demanded an "objective" probe into the case ahead of UN Security Council talks.

Russian state television earlier aired an unverified recording of a phone conversation between Yulia Skripal and her cousin who lives in Moscow.

In the call, a woman introducing herself as Yulia Skripal said she was expecting to be discharged from hospital soon and that her father Sergei was "fine".

The hospital where the pair are being treated said in their latest update last week that Sergei remained in a critical condition.

Russia's Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov Thursday complained that Britain had failed to provide "coherent answers" to Moscow's questions over the nerve agent attack.

"It will not be possible to ignore the legitimate questions we are asking," he warned hours before the UN meeting.

The Security Council "should look at this problem in every aspect and, I hope, objectively," Lavrov said.

Early Thursday morning some 60 US diplomats who were ordered out of Russia left their embassy compound in Moscow.

Russia called a meeting of the global chemical watchdog on Wednesday over the Salisbury incident, but failed in its bid to join the probe by the Organisation for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW).

Russia then requested the Security Council meeting on Thursday at 1900 GMT in New York.

Speaking in Moscow, Lavrov called for a "substantial and responsible" probe, while alleging the Skripal case was used by Britain as "a pretext, either made up or staged, for the groundless expulsions of Russian diplomats".

President Vladimir Putin said on a visit to Ankara on Wednesday that "common sense" must prevail to avoid "this damage in international relations".

Moscow was unable to get the required two-thirds of votes from members to approve a joint investigation at Wednesday's OPCW meeting.

Russia's UN ambassador Vasily Nebenzia said the meeting in New York would focus on a letter sent by British Prime Minister Theresa May which accused Moscow of carrying out the attempted assassination.

- Facing off in The Hague -

Wednesday's bid to secure a joint probe saw a day of bitter rhetoric between Moscow and Britain and its western allies.

"The purpose of Russia's ludicrous proposal at The Hague was clear –- to undermine the independent, impartial work of the international chemical weapons watchdog," he said, adding that Moscow's main goal was "to obscure the truth and confuse the public."

Britain is carrying out its own probe, with independent technical assistance from OPCW experts.

Sergei Naryshkin, head of Russia's SVR foreign intelligence, warned Wednesday that both sides must avoid tensions escalating to the dangerous levels of the Cold War.

He called the affair a "grotesque provocation ... crudely concocted by the British and American security services."

OPCW experts have already taken on-site samples which are being analysed in The Hague, as well as in four other certified laboratories. The watchdog said it expected the results by early next week.

But in a move hailed as a vindication by Moscow, the British defence laboratory analysing the nerve agent revealed Tuesday that it could not say whether the substance came from Russia.

The Kremlin immediately demanded an apology from May and her government for implicating Putin in the nerve agent attack, saying this "idiocy has gone too far."

On Thursday, The Times newspaper cited British security sources saying they believe they have pinpointed the location of a Russian laboratory where the nerve agent used in Salisbury was manufactured.
Vasily Nebenzia, the Russian ambassador to the United Nations, tells the UN Security Council the United Kingdom has created a "fake story" and says Russia has "told our British colleagues that you are playing with fire and you will be sorry." UK representative to UN Karen Pierce tells the Security Council UK actions "stand up to any scrutiny" and compares Russian requests to join the investigation to an arsonist investigating their own fire.