‘Roads lead to Russia’: UK security minister backs Boris Johnson over Salisbury nerve agent spy poisoning row

Russian responsibility for the Salisbury nerve agent attack is “beyond reasonable doubt”, the security minister said today.

Ben Wallace spoke out ahead of another bid by Moscow to undermine Britain’s allegations tonight, this time by denouncing it at a meeting of the United Nations Security Council.

Mr Wallace, a key supporter of Boris Johnson, who has been accused by Labour of making loose comments that were not supported by the evidence, was deployed on a morning media round to steady nerves by restating the case and saying “roads lead to Russia”.

“We can say that we are beyond reasonable doubt of the view that the Russian state is behind this,” he told Today.

Emergency services investigate the scene where the pair were found last month
AFP/Getty Images

Mr Wallace said the Government believed the Novichok nerve agent had been manufactured in Russia and was “only capable of being produced by a nation state”.

Its belief that Russia was behind the attack was also based on “intelligence we hold” and the police investigation into the attempted murder.

The head of the British military facility analysing the Novichok nerve agent said it has 'not verified the precise source' of the substance
AFP/Getty Images

Russian foreign minister Sergey Lavrov claimed the UK had “legitimate questions” to answer about the assault on Sergei Skripal and his daughter Yulia.

Moscow failed yesterday in a bid to obtain joint control of the investigation at a meeting of international chemical weapons inspectors. It lost the vote after Britain argued its move revealed the Kremlin was “nervous” of what might be found.

Theresa May visited the scene of the poison attack in Salisbury 
PA

Mr Johnson, the Foreign Secretary, has faced calls for an inquiry after he stated that the defence lab at Porton Down was sure that the agent was made by Russia. The chief executive of the labs later said it could not be certain.

Mr Johnson accused Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn of siding with the “Russian spin machine”.

Russian spy poisoning: Military forces work on a van in Winterslow
AP

Mr Corbyn was criticised for comparing the case with the “flawed intelligence and dodgy dossiers” behind the Iraq invasion of 2003.

Mr Wallace said such comparisons were invalid. “There’s no missing nerve agent that no one can find — it was used in Salisbury, we had three people seriously ill, two obviously remain in hospital in critical condition, and there is no doubt that we have found nerve agent,” he said.

Moscow has asked for an open session of the UN Security Council to be held today at 8pm UK time to debate the case.

Create a FREE account to continue reading

eros

Registration is a free and easy way to support our journalism.

Join our community where you can: comment on stories; sign up to newsletters; enter competitions and access content on our app.

Your email address

Must be at least 6 characters, include an upper and lower case character and a number

You must be at least 18 years old to create an account

* Required fields

Already have an account? SIGN IN

By clicking Create Account you confirm that your data has been entered correctly and you have read and agree to our Terms of use , Cookie policy and Privacy policy .

This site is protected by reCAPTCHA and the Google Privacy Policy and Terms of Service apply.

Thank you for registering

Please refresh the page or navigate to another page on the site to be automatically logged in