SALISBURY: Inspectors from the Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW) have begun work at the scene of the nerve agent attack on former Russian agent Sergei Skripal in the English city of Salisbury, a Reuters photographer said.
The inspectors were seen arriving at the Mill pub in Salisbury where Skripal and his daughter Yulia had a drink on March 4.
The pair were later found unconscious on a bench outside The Maltings shopping center. They remain critically ill in hospital.
But a senior Foreign Ministry official indicated that Russia won’t recognize results of the OPCW investigation.
Vladimir Yermakov, deputy head of the Foreign Ministry’s department for non-proliferation, was asked during a briefing whether Moscow would accept the results of the OPCW probe.
Yermakov said that “unscrupulous efforts” to investigate the attack without sharing the case files with Moscow “is not going to work for us.”
Yermakov went on to slam Britain for refusing to cooperate in a probe into the poisoning of a Russian ex-spy on English soil, criticizing its “Russophobia” and “island mentality.”
“Pull yourselves away a little bit from your Russophobia, your island mentality,” Vladimir Yermakov, told a briefing of representatives of foreign diplomatic missions.
Britain said Wednesday that its ambassador in Moscow has snubbed the meeting.
The Kremlin slammed the absence of British ambassador Laurie Bristow, saying it showed London’s unwillingness to cooperate.
On Tuesday, Moscow had invited all ambassadors to Russia to a meeting with foreign ministry experts to hear its views on the poisoning of former double agent Sergei Skripal in an English city earlier this month. Several western diplomatic missions said their chiefs did not attend the meeting in solidarity with the UK.
Chancellor Angela Merkel of Germany has called for “transparency from Russia” over the nerve agent attack on a former Russian spy in Britain.
Merkel emphasized Germany’s solidarity with Britain in a speech to lawmakers in Berlin on Wednesday. She said that “a lot of evidence points to Russia and so transparency from Russia is required to quell the suspicion.”
Merkel added: “I would be happy if I didn’t have to name Russia here, but we can’t disregard evidence because we don’t want to name Russia.”