Russian ambassador laughs off the idea that the Kremlin was behind the Salisbury poisoning | UK News

The United Kingdom is “waging war” against Russia by supplying weapons to Ukraine, Moscow’s ambassador said.

Andrei Kelin, Russia’s ambassador to the UK, told the BBC’s Sunday With Laura Kuenssberg programme: “My government firmly believes that the UK government is waging an aggressive war against Russia at the hands of the Ukrainians.

‘This is a proxy war led by the UK Government, supplying lethal weapons with which the UK Government is killing Russian soldiers and civilians.’

He added: “I think you are aggressive and are waging a proxy war against Russia.”

The comments came as part of a wide-ranging interview with Kuenssberg, in which the ambassador laughed at the idea of ​​Russia’s involvement in the Salisbury poisoning and said he had nothing to say to the victims.

When asked by Kuenssberg about the 2018 Novichok poisoning, which the UK, US, French, German and Canadian governments believe was perpetrated by Russia after an extensive investigation, Kelin dismissed the allegations as “absurd” and said “too many governments ”. were involved.

The family of Dawn Sturgess, who died in the attack, has called on Vladimir Putin to testify at the inquest into her death.

But when asked whether he thinks the Russian president should attend, Klein said: “I don’t believe President Putin will go to Britain just to witness something.”

‘Why drag this story out for so long?’ He added.

Kelin also rejected calls for the two suspects, Ruslan Boshirov and Alexander Petrov, to take part in the inquiry, citing an interview broadcast on Russian state TV in which the former intelligence officers claimed they were only in London to see Salisbury Cathedral. as proof of his innocence.

The Salisbury poisonings were a failed attempt to kill former Russian double agent Sergei Skripal and his daughter Yulia in a Salisbury restaurant in 2018. The suspects are believed to have carried out the attempt using the deadly Novichok nerve agent, which was hidden in a perfume bottle. .

After the attack, the suspects threw the perfume bottle into a nearby trash bin, where it was found by a man named Charlie Rowley, who introduced it to his partner Dawn Sturgess, who sprayed it on her wrist.

Sturgess immediately began to feel unwell and was rushed to hospital, where she died several days later, but Rowley, who also had contact with the nerve agent, survived.

When asked if he had any words for Dawn Sturgess’ family, Kelin appeared to laugh and said: ‘I’ve never met this family… If someone died, of course we’re worried about that.’

In another part of the interview, Kelin belittled Ukrainian President Zelensky’s “victory plan” against Russia, in which he outlined measures to end the Russian invasion by the end of next year.

“If Zelensky doesn’t negotiate with us, that’s fine,” said the ambassador. ‘He will lose more and more ground.’

When asked about Russia’s ongoing invasion of Ukraine, Kelin said Zelensky “doesn’t want peace… he keeps asking for more and more; NATO, EU assistance, defense packages.

‘Anything, but nothing about negotiations.’

Among Zelensky’s proposals to end the war are formally accepting Ukraine into NATO and lifting the ban on long-range missile strikes deep inside Russia.

But Kelin said Zelensky is becoming “desperate” and that the Ukrainian resistance knows it is losing and becoming increasingly “weak.”

Kiev has steadfastly refused to negotiate with Russia throughout the conflict, as it believes that any attempt to do so would result in the permanent loss of Ukrainian territory.

Kelin suggested the conflict could stop if Western nations agreed to stop supplying Ukraine with weapons.

“No one likes war,” he said. ‘But let’s not just say, OK, (starting) tomorrow we won’t shoot each other. We won’t.

«We are in favor of the quickest solution to the conflict. But we don’t feel reciprocity’.

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