Russia’s President Vladimir Putin ordered the Salisbury poisoning to demonstrate Russian strength around the world and bears a moral responsibility a public inquiry has concluded
Sergei Skripal and his daughter, Yulia, were poisoned with the military-grade nerve agent in March 2018 in an attack that could have killed thousands, underlining a “grotesque disregard for human life” by the perpetrators
Dawn Sturgess, a mum of three, died in Salisbury District Hospital in July 2018 after accidentally ingesting nerve agent Novichok after she sprayed herself with the deadly nerve agent from a perfume bottle.
An inquiry into her death heard seven weeks of evidence – sometimes behind closed doors for national security reasons.
The inquiry chair Lord Hughes’ concluded that, “authorisation at a very high level must have been given… an attempt on the life of Sergei Skripal would not have been made without the approval of the Russian president”.
The report also contains the view that the attack could not reasonably have been prevented. Responsibility should rest primarily with the GRU, Russian military intelligence, and the people who ordered this reckless assassination plot,
In the report Lord Hughes, states, “I am sure that the responsibility for leaving behind the bottle” lay with the two GRU officers who travelled there, and that, “their doing so led directly, and foreseeably to the death of Dawn Sturgess”.
As for motive, Lord Hughes says not simply one of revenge against Skripal for his treason, “but amounted to a public statement for both international and domestic consumption, that Russia will act decisively in what it regards as its own interests”.
