Foreign Secretary Boris Johnson warned on Tuesday that Britain would respond “robustly” if it emerged that a government was behind the suspected poisoning of a former Russian double agent.
Sergei Skripal, a former colonel in Russian military intelligence who came to Britain in a spy swap in 2010, was found unconscious with his daughter Yulia in the southwestern English city of Salisbury on Sunday.
The pair, found on a bench outside a shopping centre, were treated for “suspected exposure to an unknown substance” and are currently in a critical condition in a local hospital.
Johnson told the House of Commons that it was too soon to establish the cause of the “disturbing” incident, which caused a major security alert in the normally quiet city.
But he noted “the echoes” with the 2006 poisoning in London of Kremlin critic Alexander Litvinenko, an attack that an inquiry ruled was likely ordered by President Vladimir Putin.
“I can reassure the House that should evidence emerge that implies state responsibility, then Her Majesty’s Government will respond appropriately and robustly,” Johnson said.
He added: “Though I am not now pointing fingers, I say to governments around the world that no attempt to take innocent life on UK (United Kingdom) soil will go either unsanctioned or unpunished.”
Putin’s spokesman Dmitry Peskov said earlier on Tuesday that it had no information on the “tragic situation”.
“We don’t have information about what could be the cause, what this person did,” he said.
He said London had not made any requests for assistance in the investigation, but added: “Moscow is always ready for cooperation.”
