UK announces identities of 2 suspects in murder of former spy Skripal
(Baonghean.vn) - Reuters news agency quoted British prosecutors on September 5 as saying that there was enough evidence to charge two Russian citizens with plotting to murder former Russian double agent Sergei Skripal and his daughter Yulia in Salisbury last March.
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| Two suspects in the Skripal murder announced by the British side. Photo: TASS |
According to prosecutors, the two Russian citizens are Alexander Petrov and Ruslan Boshirov. London has issued a European arrest warrant for the two suspects. British prosecutors also said they will not ask Russia to extradite the two suspects because Russian law does not allow the extradition of its own citizens.
The head of Britain's counter-terrorism police force said the two suspects, aged in their 40s, used Russian passports when travelling.
The two men traveled from Moscow to London on March 2 and returned to Russia on March 4. Authorities also found Novichok in the hotel room where they stayed.
It is expected that on September 5, British Prime Minister Theresa May will make an official statement in Parliament on this issue.
For its part, the Russian Foreign Ministry urged London to cooperate in investigating the incident, as it requires careful analysis, and asserted that the UK's announcement of the suspect's identity means nothing to Moscow. Meanwhile, the Russian mission to the Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW) stressed that the country had no involvement in the poisoning of former spy Skripal.
On March 4, Sergei Skripal and his daughter Yulia were found unconscious on a chair at work in the city of Salisbury, southwest England. Both were determined to have been poisoned with the nerve agent Novichok and have since recovered.
Although the investigation has not concluded, Britain believes that the Novichok poison was produced in Russia and accuses Moscow of being behind the incident, while calling on Western allies to expel hundreds of Russian diplomats.
So far, Russia has denied all accusations and also announced the expulsion of an equivalent number of diplomats from many member countries of the European Union (EU) and the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO). So far, Sergei Skripal and his son have not made any statement about the culprit who harmed them.
