The British government has launched another spiral of information campaign aimed to demonize and isolate Russia across the world, Russia’s Embassy in London said on Friday.
The embassy’s press release was issued following a publication in the Daily Telegraph, which says that the police and secret services identified a third suspect allegedly involved in the poisoning of Sergey Skripal, a former Russian military intelligence officer, and his daughter Yulia in the English city of Salisbury.
"Unfortunately, we witness yet another turn of a powerful media campaign launched by the Tory government in March aimed at discrediting and isolating Russia on the international arena. The whole situation around the Skripals’ case reminds of an endless soap opera as the media are repeatedly referring to anonymous sources in the British security and secret services and publishing multiple unverifiable versions and leaks on a daily basis," the press release says.
The Russian diplomatic mission pointed out that "the British authorities have categorically refused to cooperate with Russia, refrained from providing or requesting information via official channels, thus violating at least five different international Conventions, while tirelessly classifying all circumstances of Sergei and Yulia Skripal poisoning. Nobody has seen the Skripals, who are Russian nationals, for a long time. Their condition and whereabouts are unknown. Toxicity of the poison used in Salisbury is also impossible to verify."
"We struggle to understand why the British authorities continue to act in such a manner, and cannot find any plausible explanation except that that the whole situation with the Skripals’ case has been a staged provocation from the very beginning. The information that the government feeds through the media raises many questions," the press release says.
"It is aimed at diverting public attention from the real problems in the UK caused by the uncertainty around Brexit," it claims.
In the Russian diplomats’ opinion, "such policy distracts the investigation away from the truth and ignites anti-Russian sentiments, pushed forward again and again at the highest political level. The most recent examples are the statements made in New York by the Prime Minister, and then by Foreign Secretary Jeremy Hunt following his ‘meeting’ with Sergei Lavrov, which in reality has never taken place."
"Moreover, the Tory government tries to impose on all its own vision of the incident through the media, while refusing to officially engage with Russia. Such approach is unacceptable; it contradicts the rules of international engagement," the embassy said in the press release.
Salisbury incident
If the British version is to be believed, on March 4 former Russian military intelligence officer Sergei Skripal, convicted in Russia of spying for Britain, and his daughter Yulia, were exposed to a nerve agent of Novichok class in Salisbury. The British government claimed that Russia was "highly likely" behind the incident. Moscow strongly dismissed all speculations on that score, adding that programs for developing this substance had never existed in the Soviet Union or Russia. Britain’s military chemical laboratory at Porton Down has failed to identify the origin of the substance that poisoned the Skripals.
