Posted on 09/06/2018 7:04:33 AM PDT by reaganaut1
LONDON—British authorities charged two men that they believe are Russian military intelligence officers with the attempted murder of a former spy and his daughter in March, an incident that prompted the largest-ever collective expulsion of Russian diplomats from the West.
Prosecutors charged the men—named as Alexander Petrov and Ruslan Boshirov but those names are believed to be aliases—with four offenses related to the poisoning of Sergei Skripal, who has lived in Britain since a 2010 spy exchange with Moscow. The charges also included conspiracy to murder and the use and possession of nerve agent Novichok.
In a statement to lawmakers Wednesday, Prime Minister Theresa May said the attack was almost certainly authorized at “a senior level” of the Russian state. She added that the U.K. government concluded that the suspects are officers from the Russian military intelligence service, also known as the GRU.
“This was not a rogue operation,” she said. “It was almost certainly also approved outside the GRU at a senior level of the Russian state.”
The charges reinforce how the attack—which Moscow denies—continues to provoke profound tensions between Russia and the U.K. and its allies. The U.K. said it wouldn’t seek extradition of the two men, since the Russian constitution forbids it, but that a European Arrest Warrant had been obtained, providing for their arrest if they set foot in the European Union.
Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said that in addition to failing to provide proof that the Russian state was involved in the poisoning, the British government had refused Russia’s offer to send its own investigators to the U.K. to help investigate the case.
(Excerpt) Read more at wsj.com ...
Distraction from May’s disaster of a BREXIT
Found your candidate for 2020 yet?
In MI6 and FBI we trust.
Are these guys under arrest or is this one of those Mueller “lets charge someone in a foreign country” pointless distraction.
The Brits released a timeline and a lot of photographs from their enormous number of cams all over the country.
It is suspicious two guys from Russia flew into the country in the right time frame, took a train trip from London to the right town and then got back on a plane and left.
But there are a lot of holes in the story.
It is alleged the nerve agent was spritzed from a perfume bottle on the guy’s doorknob. But it was a sequence of days that were very rainy. It is said traces of the poison were found in the hotel room these guys used, but samples could not be recovered.
An expanse of grassy park was said to be poisoned and the grass torn out and replaced. Despite the rainy period.
Several weeks/months after the event, another woman died of the poison. She lived in a different town, and the theory is she picked up the perfume bottle from somewhere and spritzed her wrist and died. This would be a perfume bottle the two guys somehow didn’t just throw in the trash and should have been long gone to a landfill.
The rationale is weak, too. The spy living in the UK had been turned loose by Russia in an exchange. If they had wanted him dead, he could have been killed before the exchange. They had years to do it.
And why this ridiculous, reckless method? Why not hide inside his house and strangle him when he comes home, after his daughter had left?
There are holes in this story.
If I answer your question will you stop stalking me?
Yes.
I think Trump has earned our support.
This is a convoluted case. The only thing I can say with certainty is that “Skripal” is the least Russian-sounding Russian name I’ve ever heard. Is he in fact an ethnic Russian? Or something else?
75% chance you are correct. The Brits are copying Robert Mueller here....as in indicting (allegedly) evil Russians who will never show up. Are non-extraditable. Is this a farce or what? America and UK.
The only reason to use a "Russian" nerve agent is so that MI 6 could plausibly blame the Russians. Or the FBI, or the CIA etc. etc.
I agree with most of Trump's policies (immigration, deregulation, taxes, but not trade) and with his judicial appointments. I don't think he is presidential. For example, I don't want the president to get in Twitter fights with random celebrities, to publicly bash his own appointees, or to call the press the "enemy of the people".
I like Ben Sasse, Tom Cotton, and Ted Cruz and would be ok with Mike Pence. Rubio I have soured on. If Trump wants the nomination, he will get it, but I hope he decides not to run again.
The economy is doing well, in part due to Trump's policies. If he were more personally popular, the GOP would be more likely to retain the House. He is at 41 approve, 54 disapprove according to the RealClear Politics average. I don't think it's good for the Republican party or the conservative movement for Trump to be the head of the Republican party for the next six years.
Can’t be true. All the internet detectives around here were sure it was a false flag.
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