Like many, my first thought at the interview of Boshirov and Petrov – which apparently are indeed their names – is that they were very unconvincing. The interview itself seemed to be set up around a cramped table with a poor camera and lighting, and the interviewer seemed pretty hopeless at asking probing questions that would shed any real light.
I had in fact decided that their story was highly improbable, until I started seeing the storm of twitter posting, much of it from mainstream media journalists, which stated that individual things were impossible which were, in fact, not impossible at all.
The first and most obvious regards the weather on 3 and 4 March. It is in fact absolutely true that, if the two had gone down to Salisbury on 3 March with the intention of going to Stonehenge, they would have been unable to get there because of the snow. It is therefore perfectly possible that they went back the next day to try again; and public transport out of Salisbury was still severely disrupted, and many roads closed, on 4 March. Proof of this is not at all difficult to find.
This image is from the Salisbury Journal’s liveblog on 4 March.
Those mocking the idea that the pair were blocked by snow from visiting Stonehenge have pointed to the CCTV footage of central Salisbury not showing snow on the afternoon of 4 March. Well, that is central Salisbury, it had of course been salted and cleared. Outside there were drifts.
So that part of their story in fact turns out not to be implausible as social media is making out; in fact it fits precisely with the actual facts.
The second part of their story that has brought ridicule is the notion that two Russians would fly to the UK for the weekend and try to visit Salisbury. This ridicule has been very strange to me. Weekend breaks – arrive on Friday and return on Sunday – are a standard part of the holiday industry. Why is it apparently unthinkable that Russians fly on weekend breaks as well as British people?
Even more strange is the idea that it is wildly improbable for Russian visitors to wish to visit Salisbury cathedral and Stonehenge. Salisbury Cathedral is one of the most breathtaking achievements of Norman architecture, one of the great cathedrals of Europe. It attracts a great many foreign visitors. Stonehenge is world famous and a world heritage site. I went on holiday this year and visited Wurzburg to see the Bishop’s Palace, and then the winery cooperative at Sommerach. Because somebody does not choose to spend their leisure time on a beach in Benidorm does not make them a killer. Lots of people go to Salisbury Cathedral.
There seems to be a racist motif here – Russians cannot possibly have intellectual or historical interests, or afford weekend breaks.
The final meme which has worried me is “if they went to see the cathedral, why did they visit the Skripal house?” Well, no evidence at all has been presented that they visited the Skripal house. They were captured on CCTV walking past a petrol station 500 yards away – that is the closest they have been placed to the Skripal house.
The greater mystery about these two is, if they did visit the Skripal House and paint Novichok on the doorknob, why did they afterwards walk straight past the railway station again and head into Salisbury city centre, where they were caught window shopping in a coin and souvenir shop with apparently not a care in the world, before eventually returning to the train station? It seems a very strange attitude to a getaway after an attempted murder. In truth their demeanour throughout the photographs is consistent with their tourism story.
The Russians have so far presented this pair in a very unconvincing light. But on investigation, the elements of their story which are claimed to be wildly improbable are not inconsistent with the facts.
There remains the much larger question of the timing.
The Metropolitan Police state that Boshirov and Petrov did not arrive in Salisbury until 11.48 on the day of the poisoning. That means that they could not have applied a nerve agent to the Skripals’ doorknob before noon at the earliest. But there has never been any indication that the Skripals returned to their home after noon on Sunday 4 March. If they did so, they and/or their car somehow avoided all CCTV cameras. Remember they were caught by three CCTV cameras on leaving, and Borishov and Petrov were caught frequently on CCTV on arriving.
The Skripals were next seen on CCTV at 13.30, driving down Devizes road. After that their movements were clearly witnessed or recorded until their admission to hospital.
So even if the Skripals made an “invisible” trip home before being seen on Devizes Road, that means the very latest they could have touched the doorknob is 13.15. The longest possible gap between the novichok being placed on the doorknob and the Skripals touching it would have been one hour and 15 minutes. Do you recall all those “experts” leaping in to tell us that the “ten times deadlier than VX” nerve agent was not fatal because it had degraded overnight on the doorknob? Well that cannot be true. The time between application and contact was between a minute and (at most) just over an hour on this new timeline.
In general it is worth observing that the Skripals, and poor Dawn Sturgess and Charlie Rowley, all managed to achieve almost complete CCTV invisibility in their widespread movements around Salisbury at the key times, while in contrast “Petrov and Boshirov” managed to be frequently caught in high quality all the time during their brief visit.
This is especially remarkable in the case of the Skripals’ location around noon on 4 March. The government can only maintain that they returned home at this time, as they insist they got the nerve agent from the doorknob. But why was their car so frequently caught on CCTV leaving, but not at all returning? It appears very much more probable that they came into contact with the nerve agent somewhere else, while they were out.
I shall write a further post on these timing questions shortly.
They weren’t prepared for the particularly harsh weather they encountered coming from a subtropical part of Russia.
Don’t repeat what you read in the media, think for yourself!
So they went on the third could not get to Stonehenge, went back on the 4th when buses were running and then decided not to go to Stonehenge after all?
They said it started to snow again that afternoon so they decided to return to London. Not too difficult to understand.
Let it go, Craig. You’ll always have a core base who will egg you on but it’s time to just accept that you messed up and pick up what remains of your credibility.
Anon1
Where did he go wrong?
Question is also, why are you constantly here to harass him and others here?
Cannae tolerate any questioning of the powers that be, by anyone, anywhere.
Anders Novichok
Responding to what, thats what I am asking. Anon1 and perhaps yourself too(?) is a troll here on this site.
Here is the logic: if someone puts forth an alternative hypothesis of the poisoning, and it turns out false…..then the UK government version must be correct.
The majority of the globe? Hysterical exaggeration makes you sound stupid! What you mean is a cabal of the usual western lying politicians that are responsible for the worst human atrocities!!!
You just miss the point completely. The claim on test here is not Mr Murray’s. He just consider alternatives to the story peddled by the UK government, which immediately blamed Russia for the poisoning. And if it at some point should turn out Putin ordered these two personally, there is nothing at any stage that supports what May et al have claimed, and that is the whole point. You just don’t take any unsubstantiated government claim at face value, whatever government. It is really embarrassing to even have to point out such truisms. The reason Mr Murray does not answer himself is probably because he has a life, and can’t spend an infinite amount of time answering puerile nonsense.
We’ve still not seen any evidence from the UK Government yet.
The accusers must prove everything. It is not the place of those accused to try and explain why they didn’t do something.
StratCom QAnon drone.
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2016/may/03/how-britain-funds-the-propaganda-war-against-isis-in-syria
Dungroanin, could you expatiate a little further? I’m not trying to be clever, interested what you mean exactly.
Sure – QAnon is the alt-righty conspiracy site in the US which has been alleged to be a covert US agency site. Deep State.
StratComm is the setup of the UK Ministry of Defence and ‘contractors’ who have been running the propaganda operation for the UK deep state.
Drone – is what Anon1 is. Maybe more than one person. Maybe a multiple identity. Maybe a AI type bot – I have been unable to engage it/him/her in convesation to apply the Turing test to determine that.
The individuals involved in the state propaganda setup are identified, via StratCom > Bell Pottinger > SCL > MSM chain over a long period of time.
I have posted one linkage on the previous Skripal post. If you can’t find it and want i’ll repost it here. Please ask.
Anon1 seems to be operating as a ‘borg’ like Individual screaming ‘resistance is futile’.
They are comically transparent. Lol.
i’m russian. if i was in britain for a long time, i’ll visit at least stonehenge, because it was printed even in books for elementary school in ussr.
1. you missed one point – they claimed that 3 march they were at rail station at least for 40 min(awaiting next train), to return to london because of bad weather. so their trip this day was less an hour.
2. also being just a fitness drugs dealers, they could visit Salisbury to meet some their partner, a link in a chain of their business.
3. this business in russia is quite “gray”, because of limitations and regulations of drugs. also they could have business with cheap surrogates of fitness drugs.
4. they very look like gay couple(wide discussed thing in russia of this case).
that’s why they dislike publicity and developing of situation.
__alex__
What brings you to this page? Are you visiting as a tourist or on a professional basis?
Do you think your government wants to allow these unwilling characters to come and clear their names? At the moment they are likely to be arrested if they enter lots of tourism hotspots around the world, at least until they have cleared this simples misunderstanding up.
for particular purpose – to improve my english, i am spending some time in english speaking forum and there is some “scripal’s case battle”. to improve my arguments i searched inet for information, and found this page, and other pages with info and discussions.
i m not a gru officer. 🙂
Is there any info on the alleged Novichok poison that was allegedly found on their hotel room?
brits just claim it. no any other proof
it’s me. look at code picture(avatar). i just missed to enter the nick. but code pictures are equal.
Alex,
Anders Novichok is a tiresome idiot who is only good at insulting people. There are one or two others as well on this website. Please do not be put off by him – just learn to ignore him like the rest of us do. It was obvious to everyone except him that it was you commenting.
sorry i missed my name in prev post
seem barcode is constructed from email. i entered email, but missed nick. it was just my second post in this forum, i was mistaken
Anders Novicok
Stop your harassing and racism please.
If he was supposed to be another person he would sure not admit it the next second.
Actually comment trolls is more an Israeli thing, Russia is misdirection from the hasbara program.
Don’t answer, __alex__. He doesn’t have the right to ask you questions like that.
I thought they might be steroid dealers or even part of the club scene dealers.
I do wonder what went down on their UK Visa applications
This whole cacophony surrounding a couple of Russian pedestrians in Salisbury has the feeling of ‘switch to plan B’ about it, drawing attention away from other meaningful specifics, like fairly recent mention of a bottle having been found at the location of the Salisbury ‘incident’, which might go some way toward explaining why a discarded Nina Ricci carton and a perfume dispenser languishing in Charlie Rowley’s kitchen should have aroused interest in the first place.
Rowley’s account of fumbling with the apparatus is all well and good, but what if the applicator was attached to the bottle in the first place, as the dimensions of the box appear to suggest? Might he have been struggling to replace the component, having first undone it for some reason, either to remove or to add to the contents?
At least one eye witness account of the Skripals status when encountered on the park bench mentions that Yulia was in a worse state than her father, which might point to her having been the first to become intoxicated, probably through something they shared. I used to think ‘cigarette’, but just as likely is Yulia sampling a new perfume and asking her father to ‘Smell this. What do you think?’
The perfume bottle(s) could be the key to the mystery. Determining where the ‘perfume’ was from first of all, rather than where it went afterwards, would be hugely informative, not least because fake packaging would be a shrewd way of conveying illegal substances internationally. Airport security scans of boxed ‘Nina Ricci premier jour’ are far less likely to cause a stir than those of a pharmaceutical bottle labelled ‘Fentanyl’ in English and Chinese.
You’re spot on. My site covered this.
The evidence suggests they were hit near the bench, by a man and a woman team.
The perfume bottle may well have been handed to yulia.
https://dailyshocker.news/skirpals-the-hit-team-in-the-maltings-salisbury-new-evidence/
A man and a blonde? The blonde carrying a red bag, such as was found at the scene and taken into evidence? I wonder if Dawn Sturgess had a pair of close-fitting slacks in her wardrobe? How unfortunately coincidental that a young man (Tyler Gray) should have died of an ‘overdose’ barely ten days later, and at the very same address as that occupied by DS.
Doodlebug,
Many weeks ago someone who posts on the Blogmire had compared photos of Dawn with the mystery CCTV image. On one picture of Dawn she is seen wearing a pair of trousers (tapered jeans?) very similar looking to the ones on the CCTV images. I shall see if I can trace back to the link but I can’t promise.
My post of 19.11 – On quick reflection I think the comparison was posted on here – I shall try to find it.
Thank you. I hope you can locate the datum.
Doodlebug
Found it! It was ‘Jack’ (not sure if it’s the same Jack who is posting currently on here) who posted it originally back in July and I think it may be his own handiwork.
https://imgur.com/a/zdWycW0
I read the article you linked to. One thing in your account I don’t understand. They crossed the bridge 13.08, stopped outside the shop 13.49 and the last picture in the crossing of Fisherton’s and Summerlock’s is presumably right after. So if Skripals came the route you suggested the spotters came from the opposite direction, and reached the crossing where they could spot the car after the Skripals passed since they were seen driving on Devizes Road 13.30. And the fact that Skripals turned their phones off suggests they were probably on their way meeting whoever poisoned them, and then the spotters would be superfluous? But where were they the 40 minutes if not caught on camera?
The other thing the police will not discuss is that once they got into Salisbury, they fed ducks with children around 1.40pm.
This has been confirmed by the kids mum, who also said she was shown a cctv still of the skripals with her kids in the maltings.
So if they passed the kids bread, as the kids said happened, then so soon after touching the door handle that bread would have killed them.
Craig it all goes back to what I’ve been writing for weeks.
This skripals were targeted in Salisbury.
If you were told to kill them, would you do it as they did, or stay in Salisbury on the Saturday, wander up their road early Sunday morning in the dark, gell the house and car door handles, and be gone before the sun came up?
Yep, me to.
“This skripals were targeted in Salisbury.”
And the brand spanking new CCTV system probably recorded it happening. Come to think of it, since the pair (man + blonde) were obviously not the Skripals (as the red tops suggested they might have been) why should they have been of any particular interest? Freya Church no doubt passed beneath the gaze of CCTV too when she left the fitness centre very shortly after, but she was not put into the public arena as potentially involved. I wonder if ‘man + blonde’ were also noticed very near to the bench by CCTV as well as by Freya Church?
Very interesting the Daily Shocker blog with the theory of the spotters but the last couple of posts published I have been unable to comment as every time I click to post it shows a little bar going back and forth presumably working but never posting, probably why you have no comments for those articles. Hope you can fix it.
In respect of novichok via door handle imo there are so many reasons it cannot be, or maybe I should say, no one can convince me it was. Mainly how could both Skripals collapse at exactly the same time with the many physical variables between subjects in play added with the situational variables, i.e. the dosage which could never be the same for both but dependent on who touched it first, how many times, and how many times they washed and or wiped their hands in between. Then the comparison with the different times it took the novichok affect Sturgess and Rowley, Sturgess within 15mins, Rowley some 6 hours later, although he did wash his hands as soon as it spilt. But then I am not convinced Rowley tells the truth having changed the story of where they found it several times and the fact a friend of Dawn’s told the press they had found it in QE Gardens just 5mins walk from the bench where the Skripals collapsed.
Another strange thing: remember they visited a pup and a restaurant. How did they pay, money or credit card? In every case the service people were poisonned, if the Skripals had before touched Novitchok. But no one of the service got ill after the Skripals had left the locations. So my conclusion is: They were poisonned after the visit of the restaurant.
The UK government’s line on all this is obvious twaddle.
I found it interesting that Putin announced that the two suspected Russians had been found, before these two characters were displayed on RT, to give an easily questioned version of events.
I’m of the opinion that the Russians are completely taking the piss out of the UK government and it’s version of events.
After all, the Russians are relentlessly demonised by USUK – to a comical degree. The rhetoric from USUK treats Russia with utter contempt. There’s no attempt at any kind of dialogue, despite the fact that this could end with WWW3 (notice how the MSM have been very quiet on Syria this week). If I was sitting in the Kremlin, with absolutely no chance of any sane dialogue with USUK, I too would take the total piss out of them.
They said they wanted Putin/Russia to cooperate. Well, here they are!
The Russian duo are most likely “useful idiots” in that the intelligence services in the UK knew / know that they may be involved in some kind of organised crime, and were meeting someone in Salisbury to exchange something.
As if we have never heard of people being “framed for something”. Yeah, framed up in a Psyop scam run by the corrupt government.
Why stay in a hotel, the other side of London, to get a train from Waterloo on the other side of London, to Salisbury? Why did they not stay in Salisbury, if it was their intention to visit Salisbury / Stonehenge for the weekend?
These pair are likely crooks of some sort.
They probably were due to meet someone to make a deal in Salisbury on the Saturday, and the person did not turn up deliberately, so they went back on the Sunday for this reason. Psyops are planned well in advance. Hence why the BBC was speaking to Sergei Skripal months in advance.
These guys have been played. Just like the public is being played.
Why wouldnt Putin say then these are a couple of gangsters/criminals – here is all the other evidence of their criminal activities – and someone is trying to frame Russia….. this is how sophisticated the plot is etc etc.
You think Putin doesnt want the world to know there are criminals in Russia? He said, actually lads say you were there on holiday, that will do the trick!
Putin said there was nothing PARTICULARLY criminal with these two people. So he implied they are involved in something but it was not a novichok thing.
Agree with the general gist of your post, but with regard to where they stayed, they did say they’d originally intended to visit London. So that would explain the hotel booking.
However, I do get the impression that these two have something to hide, though quite what that is . . . hmm, difficult. They’re not very convincing, but then neither has the UK narrative been very convincing since it happened. False claims by Boris Johnson. The Skripals strange movements. The missing time. The whole thing is odd – from both sides.
They are obviously closeted gays — forty-year old guys do not share a bed to save money, then go out to buy New Balance shoes and down jackets offline on a whim because their feet got wet in Salisbury, plus two lay-over plane tickets. Their ‘medium-sized business’ of dietary and health supplement consulting is targeted to closeted gays who want more attractive figures.
London is full of closeted gays of homophobic nationalities to numerous to list. But a start could be made with the English themselves — think for a moment about Alan Turing, Britain’s Code-Breaking WWII Hero who along with 50,000 others was ordered chemically castrated. Jeremy Thorpe is top hit on google search.
Traveling under their own names, they were there in London o consult with a well-heeled closeted gay client or two. They go to Geneva regularly to consult with well-heeled closeted gay clients. They make their living via health and nutritional consulting for well-heeled closeted gay clients. Now all that has been put in jeopardy, in addition to personal exposure/embarassment back home.
The transport breakdown they mention may have impeded travel by a well-heeled closeted gay client. So they took a trip to the south of England expecting better weather but not finding it. They took out an extra days’ plane ticket because there was some uncertainty about client scheduling.
I don’t see them as male prostitutes — twenty years too old for that — unless they offered some very unusual services. And what could those be, given kinky young hunks are readily available on short notice online in any country worldwide? There is tremendous pressure on youthful appearance in gay culture which is tough on the middle-aged. So their business model makes some sense. As they say, a lot of their client base was not in Europe but in Russia.
Just look at the RT editor’s twitter feed if you doubt homophobia is widespread in Russia. Do their clients want their names up there? Who would use a consultant that cannot maintain discretion, no one. Their client list is no different than the little black book of a Washington madame who services policians. It is the reputational basis for referrals that underlie the business model, people are paying extra for it and might pay third parties extra to have the two offed, asap, to avoid exposure. No wonder they are nervous.
That’s how Russians visit the UK, via haphazard, self organised travel arrangements. Less than 10% of Russians visiting the UK come as part of an organised tour. It’s the polar opposite of Brits traveling abroad. (ONS)
It is yet another “quite a story”. The Skirpals affair would indeed make a fantastic play when the truth does come out… As one day it must! What i find quite surreal is to two gay men (if that is what they are) could become Russian heroes… Who knows maybe they already are? If the russiophobia does subside after their coming out/forward on the media Putin ought to make an example of them – positively!
SIMONYAN: Right. Here’s the photo that’s got the whole world puzzled. Gatwick. You’re going through the gate at the same time, even at the same second. How do you explain that?
BOSHIROV: We always go through the gate together. Through the same gate, with the same customs officer. One after another. We walked through that corridor together. We’re always together. As to how it happened – us walking there at the same second and then separately – I think it’s a question that should be put to them.
SIMONYAN: So what about these photos then? You say it never happened? Or were they doctored?
BOSHIROV: Well, I don’t really know…
https://www.rt.com/news/438356-rt-petrov-boshirov-full-interview/
“Here’s the photo that’s got the whole world puzzled.”
Ha. Nobody is puzzled by it. Even Craig Murray admitted he might have got that one wrong, and you can see the gates involved on Google Maps.
It’s the same gate. One of the photo’s is mirrored, as has been –convincingly imho– shown here. I don’t at present read too much nefariousness in that (it happens a LOT). But you never know.
Yes it’s the same gate and the same gate camera but a hand-held phone camera taking pictures off the cctv monitor from dissimilar positions.
The time stamps were added later; someone used poor judgement in using the same time stamp. It is laziness: the photos are stacked as layers in Photoshop or similar. The text is floated as vector in a third layer. That layer is then duplicated. Then the two text layers are flattened separately onto the two raster layers. In some scientific photo apps like ImageJ, one copy of the text would paste through the entire stack. Default ghosted font rather than black text or white text is used so that the text is legible however the grays vary in the background.
Right, inconsequential provided the time stamp is accurate enough. Should not have been done given public interest. Only the cctv original has any evidentiary value in a court of law.
If it was the Ukrainians or the Israelis or the CIA or MI6 to frame Russia then they absolutely hit the jackpot!
What were the chances that two fit Russian men who could plausibly be intelligence officers flew to the UK to visit Salisbury and not only visited but did so twice in quite an odd way – and also decided to stay in quite a run down hotel in east london – on the day that the Ukranians etc decided to poison Sergei Skripal to frame Russia? Pretty low, I think any sane person would agree.
What’s strange is that Russians could be so incompetent and now come up with such a ridiculous story – far more believable was the idea that MI6 was faking the pictures etc.
This does all rather support the view of the hawks that Putin is just being brazen – I’ll murder who I want, and I’m not even bothering to cover my tracks.
And what do the hawks suggest he’d gain by confirming their demonization of him?
Yes because trashing your economy for a bit of kudos and killing a fat old git is worth it isn’t it.
If you believe that simplistic bollocks I feel sorry for you.
Who was murdered? The cat and the hamsters?
“What were the chances that two fit Russian men who could plausibly be intelligence officers flew to the UK to visit Salisbury and not only visited but did so twice in quite an odd way – and also decided to stay in quite a run down hotel in east london – on the day that the Ukranians etc decided to poison Sergei Skripal to frame Russia? Pretty low, I think any sane person would agree.”
Yes, but the chances are also pretty low that an attempted murder with a chemical weapon would just randomly happen to take place within a few miles of the UK’s primary chemical weapons research facility..So we know for certain that some sort of unlikely coincidence happened here, the question is which one it was (or possibly, both were just coincidences).
If the suspects are intelligence officers, I doubt they were there to kill the Skripals. The point about the perfume bottle is very good one: GRU must have some women working for it, so why wouldn’t they have a woman smuggle the bottle through customs? .
The key question, it seems to me, is the reliability of the supposed traces of novichok in the suspects’ hotel room. Other than that, the case against them seems entirely circumstantial and full of holes.
It had to be near Porton Down to preserve the viability of “proving” it was the Novichok…..that is the fundamental basis of this complete fit up surely? Then that proceeds into Syrian chemicals…international condemnation of Russia etc etc.
So the police claim to have discovered Novichok in the hotel the two guys stayed at on May 4. But did not tell the hotel owner (or make any attempt to cordon off the contaminated room), for four months.
https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-6139871/Owner-hotel-Russians-hid-novichok-told-police-killer-guests-YESTERDAY.html
The people writing the official narrative have officially jumped the shark.
Right. The swabs were all negative if any swabbing was done at all. Two months of guests and no one affected? Two month and the room never cleaned in a two-star hotel? Two positive q-tips swipes decontaminated a whole room? At best, they could have sent Porton Down a couple of swabs from the perfume bottle, all it takes is a different provenance note on the plastic baggie.
Speaking of sweating it out! As this gay business story unravels, so does the room test. Are we to believe the true perps used the room previously, spilling novichok?
FCO got greedy with the swab story (as nothing else linked the two to the Skripals) , now comes the blow-back: how can they possibly walk back the false evidence cited by Basu? Is he to fall on his sword? Is he to say he relied on the false word of FCO without naming the name there?
At any rate, these guys didn’t do it. So who did? Russian organized crime elements in Spain unhappy with Sergei ratting on them? Why then target Yulia’s visit? The perfume bottle was hardly targeted at Sergei.
I cannot see what the problem is of two Russians going on a flying visit to Salisbury.
I was sitting in a pub in Paddington having a pint when a picture of the little mermaid in Copenhagen Denmark caught my attention so after another pint I decided to pop over to Copenhagen and visit the Viking Museum and then spend the evening in Nyhavn Papa Bue’s Viking Jazz Band and as I was carrying my passport with me I went straight from the pub after another pint.I came back home after three days after having a jolly good time.
Obviously, we need more information, but comparing your slightly squiffy decision to take a quick trip to Copenhagen with two Russian tourists travelling to London/Salisbury for a mini-break is like comparing apples with oranges. Firstly, you don’t (yet) need a visa to visit Denmark. Russians need a UK visa to come to London. This is not a simple process – it is a lengthy process (2 – 8 weeks). As far as I am aware, this was their first trip to the UK, so they had applied for a UK visa SPECIFICALLY with the aim of visiting Stonehenge and Salisbury. It’s not beyond the realms of possibility that this is true, but it seems slightly odd to go to the huge expense of acquiring a UK visa $124 each, plus SIX flight segments (three each) and make such a balls-up of organising your mini-break. I’m not saying they’re guilty, I’m just saying it’s unusual.
Bear in mind that Russians need visa to travel anywhere in Europe, UK is not an exception here. Furthermore, these chaps are obviously homosexuals who happen to live, for all we know, in a very homophobic country (Russia). They must have been cherishing any trip abroad, where they can hang out freely, without fear (not any more, thanks to the Brits.). So it’s not more strange they picked Salisbury than any other place in Europe.
Which opens another question: we DO know that homosexuals are not allowed to work for any intelligence agency in Russia, for their being easy targets for blackmail.
You draw the conclusion yourself.
Obviously homosexuals? How on earth did you reach that conclusion? And yes, Russians need a visa to travel anywhere in Europe, but one Schengen visa covers most of Europe and costs 35 Euro. They already had Schengen visas, so if they wanted a trip abroad, why not travel on their existing visa to any of the 26 Schengen countries, instead of coming to Salisbury at enormous expense during a cold snap. And why the two, separate return leg flights? Again, unlike some people, I don’t claim to know, I’m just pointing out that two Russians on a mini-break to the UK is not the same as two Brits on a pissed jolly to Amsterdam.
I am trying to learn Russian, so I saw the interview and read the English transcript, just to make sure I got everything, which I didn’t, by the way (my Russian is still very poor 🙁 Anyway, during the interview, they tried to play down the fact that they took the same double room in that London hotel (it’s cheaper that way my arse). Well, the thing is I cannot conceive of two Russian alpha-male agents on a GRU mission, all paid by state, taking the same room in a cheap London hotel. Or any other two straight men, for that matter. That’s why.
Back to your question: the visa requirement applies to all Russians, which doesn’t prevent UK from being one of the favourite destinations for Russians. Please, explain that. For what reason should we consider these two individuals an exception to this pattern?
The bad weather probably came as a big a shock to them as it did to me, doubt they anticipated that when they booked it. I wouldn’t choose to stay in Salisbury overnight either.
According to the Office of National Statistics that’s just how Russians travel to the UK, adhoc travel and accommodation. Less 10% of Russians visiting the UK come as part of an organised tour.
Russian men share hotels rooms all the time. All Olympic athletes share hotels rooms, all footballers share hotel rooms and all Russian television male staff, travelling to sports’ events abroad share hotel rooms. There is nothing odd about it in the least. As for the cheap hotel – there are probably more security cameras in expensive centrally located hotels than in a flop house on the outskirts.
In the full interview the two guys complained the UK Gov. hadn’t released photos of them in the cathedral area. The interviewer asked them if they took photos, and they said ‘yes’. I wonder if RT could get access to these photos. That would hep their story.
First comment on Craig’s tweet:
Please stop it Craig, I have a lot of time for your writing, but this is embarrassing”
Just about sums it up. And that’s from a fan.
Anon1
Please stop what?
Another comment harassing the blog owner, what is your purpose? Are you paid to be here?
Stop embarrassing himself. It’s not my comment.
It comes as no surprise, Jack, given your predeliction for conspiracy theories, that you think that expressing dissenting views (which Craig welcomes) on this blog means I’m “paid to be here”.
Anon1
You havent presented any evidence, you have put out one liners defamning Craig. Are you really doing this for free months after months?
Predilection, beforr someone pops up.
*before*
Sorry. A little tongue in cheek.My own feeling is why is Craig getting bogged down in this? He’ll be talking about raspberries and cheap air-flights next…
I have huge respect for Craig, but dithering around at the edges seems to be not confined to England.
Yes he is, by long-suffering tax payers…
https://theintercept.com/2014/02/24/jtrig-manipulation/
… although he could be from any number of state actors, who employ huge numbers of people doing the same stuff (and once again, all on tax payer’s money).
With regard to the UK, if you’re not familiar with this stuff, you could check out ‘The Investigatory Powers Act’, which is the most egregious assault on civil liberties in modern history, anywhere in the world…
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2016/nov/19/extreme-surveillance-becomes-uk-law-with-barely-a-whimper
I could go on and on with this stuff, but get somewhat tired of banging my head against a brick wall.
RobG, you are completely world-accurate, the brick wall is moving somewhat
. . .and IPA is born from RIPA which was found to be illegal today, by Sir Winston Leonard Spencer-Churchill°, no less.
etc
°Actually Winnie’s european court of human rights, before the Joint Threat Research Group typists get in a tizzy,
more at https://www.rte.ie/news/europe/2018/0913/993475-eu-court-uk-surveillance/
Anders Novichok
You have to stop “digging” when the truth is out, there is no clarity yet. Why are you trying silence people?
Anders Novichok
As I said, when this incident is clarified we could bury it, you want to bury it now because you are not interested in what happend, you dont care about facts.
Anders Novichok
Yes it change according to typos in the email/nick.
It appears some want people to stop digging and accept this total bollocks story and ridiculous timeline without question.
Sorry, no can do.
Yes, I expect the powers that be are quaking in their boots at the thought of your investigation.
Listen my little old chap.
Im telling you that the official story is untrue.
Im not saying how, but some people have more information than others.
You think HMG is a pure and innocent party in all this. Bully for you.
https://twitter.com/Snowden/status/1040204470280441858
Ed thanks the ‘head-bangers’
https://hudoc.echr.coe.int/eng#{%22itemid%22:[%22001-186048%22]}
LOTS of details
The …applications were introduced following revelations by Edward Snowden relating to the electronic surveillance programmes operated by the intelligence services of the United States of America and the United Kingdom.
The applicants, who are listed in the Appendix, all believed that due to the nature of their activities, their electronic communications were likely to have either been intercepted by the United Kingdom intelligence services; obtained by the United Kingdom intelligence services after being intercepted by foreign governments; and/or obtained by the United Kingdom authorities from Communications Service Providers
which they were
I notice the BBC had Andrew Wood on to rubbish the story, he of the Steele dodgy dossier fame.
It’s hard to believe the UK didn’t know a ton of background on these guys. They might have been chosen because of the closet gay angle, the thinking being they would never have the courage to come forward. Closeted gays in the GRU? That is an invitation to blackmail. Let’s be clear, GRU is a branch of the Russian military. They recruit from elite soldiers, Afghan veteran paratroopers like career soldier Sergei Skripal (and his brother).
I agree with the content of your post, Craig. What puzzles me is why then you begin with a headline such as “The Strange Russian Alibi”, and why your first paragraph leads the reader to think that you did not believe a word they said. From the second paragrapgh onwards it becomes clear that you have found very reasonable explanations for many of the things they say, e.g. about the weather, etc. So, this “Russian alibi”, which is rather the alibi presented by Petrov and Bushirov, does not look all that strange, right?
It is true that these two men look tense and uncomfortable being questioned. It could be that they are indeed a gay couple not precisely happy to expose the details of their personal relationship, or it could be that their job in Russia is not precisely 100% legal. At one point I am prepared to think that the Russian security services started to track them down as soon as May finished her speech, found all about them, and – being absolutely sure that they had zero connections with the Russian Government and the Skripal affair – pretty much forced them to come out and explain that they indeed had nothing to do with it. Perhaps their contacting Simonyan was not so voluntary after all. But the point is that Putin would never risk being caught off-guard by sending two “GRU hitmen” to be interviewed on national TV. The way things developed so quickly after Theresa May’s speech seem to indicate that Putin has destroyed the whole Skripal affair. I do not know how on earth they plan to convince Interpol’s General Assembly that red alerts shoud be issued against Petrov and Bushirov. The European Arrest Warrant was probably a piece of cake given the anti-Russian hysteria that now prevails in the EU, but I have a hunch that with Interpol things will be a lot harder (if they press ahead with the issue at all)
Apparently an EWA was never sought or issued, just intimated. The UK has their fingerprints but has refused to share them.
“”not precisely happy to expose their personal relationship, or their job in Russia is not precisely 100% legal.”
I would suggest ‘and’ in place of ‘or’ here. Petrov explicitly denied, in the full transcript, bringing back bags of health products for re-sale. That suggests just bringing back samples of the latest trendy item, to allow knock-offs of expensive brands sold in expensive Swiss spas be made and sold on to their Russian clientele.
Knock-offs are hardly limited to perfumes, watches and clothing. The EU requires quite a bit of labelling of chemical ingredients which would facilitate manufacture of accurate-enough copies in accurate-enough packaging.
In this case, they could be extremely leery of naming the knock-off manufacturing arm in Russia which could be quite a substantial company and see the two as an existential risk. Tomsk, RU for example has a huge business in pine needle terpenoid natural products.
If these two are in fact shortly murdered, it will launch a fresh avalanche of conspiracy theories.
@Richard D. The mystery is not that they didn’t die, it’s that they were symptom free for four hours after the alleged dose. There has been no report of an OP nerve agent acting in such a manner – they would have felt some symptoms in the intervening period and, even if this new property were true the chances of both Skripals absorbing their respective dose in such a way as to collasepse simultaneously is vanishingly small.
Unless you (or anyone else) can come up with a medical process by which this could possibly work, then these Russian’s must be innocent. Oh, and I’ve asked Dan Kaszeta, Hamish dBG, Phil Ingram, Alex Tompson & most of the BBC and no one has even attempted to provide an answer.
well they clearly weren’t infected by their front door handle, I think we have all worked that out by now. As I suggested earlier the Russian guys may have been decoys.
The decoys provided by Met police themselves. Isn’t it ironic?
“As I suggested earlier the Russian guys may have been decoys.”
MaryPaul, I must have missed that amongst at least a dozen of your assertions that they were couriers. Perhaps they were decoy couriers?
Why take one room in a cheap hotel and yet buy train tickets to Salisbury on two successive days and two sets of return plane tickets. Maybe they are superficially what they seem but also run errands and deliver packages off the record. They could easily have a packaged perfume in their lugagge, notionally bought for a friend sister female relative without it calling attention to them.
Did you try googling “book hotel Salisbury UK”? Did you think no one here would? Do you have any idea what a crummy hotel room in a tourist town costs in the rest of the free world? Salisbury hotel prices are like sleeping rough in California.
$78 The Cathedral Hotel 3-star hotel
Contemporary rooms with free Wi-Fi and flat-screen TVs in a Victorian hotel offering pub dining.
The couriers-for-hire angle still makes some sense. Documents, thumb drives, smuggled swallowed diamonds? A state actor would simply use the diplomatic pouch for any dodgy item like novi perfume.
The skip perfume bottle #1 does not imply the existence of perfume bottle #2. Unless there was a spill in Yulia’s abandoned purse. The door handle as you say is ruled out, it was contaminated by police. Or it may never have been contaminated at all, just an earlier instance of faux swabs like the London hotel room. Or a later salt for the benefit of OPCW, not that they aren’t utterly pwned by their keepers (193 nations but 1-2 pay).
Gay clubs in london perhaps?
I don’t understand all the ridicule.
The men were there by the very Metropolitan Police’s say-so.
The ridicule should have been, and should still be, addressed at the moving target that is the Governments’s story.
Precisely …… Samples at hotel are hugely important to the investigation as , for the first time in six months , it ‘proves’ a path for the Novichok back to Russia. Porton Down unusually silent on these hotel samples.
Inadmissible as evidence in a court of law: radical departure from chain of custody. That was done with the second blood samples of the Skripals’ blood; OPCW staff present for venipuncture, syringe never leaves the sight of OPCW.
The hotel room needed to be sealed immediately, before months of cleaning ladies and other guests had gone by. Even then it could be argued it was a prior guest. To the contrary, it could not be plausibly argued that the Skripals blood routinely contained prior novichok as onset was extremely rapid, severe and simultaneous.
The perfume bottle has really thrown a monkey wrench into the narrative. It is completely unsuitable as an applicator with its short nozzle and risks of misting something this dangerous. Sergei was not a likely user of “Premier Jour eau de cologne for women, a blend of musk, vanilla and, mandarin recommended for daytime wear for confident women for thefirst day at a new job”
A Nov 2017 review at Amazon.com: lady bought a fake made in Spain of all places
Tasha M
1.0 out of 5 stars Fake made in Spain! Wears off immediately!
November 2, 2017
Options: Eau De Parfum Spray 3.3 ozVerified Purchase
This product is fake! Made in Spain and wears off right away. The scent is one my favorite and this one smells very similar to the original. The result is disappointing. I wish I could have returned it but already opened and used it when realized the difference. Packaging and bottle look like original. Don’t make my mistake and don’t waste your money on fake product. I will never order again.
https://www.amazon.com/Nina-Ricci-Parfum-Spray-Premier/dp/B000V24634
Because May said it in Parliament is she immune to a charge of slander?
It was strange on first pmq day after her crappy summer. A great diversion from all things brexit and economic and political woe.
the guys mentioned Dmitry Gudkov put a reward out for them, if true just wondering what’s in it for Dmitry Gudkov
Opposition leader according to his wiki bio. Opposed to whom: Putin. What’s in it for Gudkov: damage to Putin, advancement of himself. The two are hardly going to see fair play if sent in chains to England … just look at UK tabloid accusations continuing today. Not even waiting five minutes for the internet to completely expose their personal lives and business.
Irony of ironies: the two wanted to visit Old Sarum and the Salisbury cathedral, not realizing the Magna Carta is today is a joke, just an empty icon having nothing to do with innocent until proven guilty, who has time for procedural bs any more. Gudkov and his bounty hunters would be right at home in the present UK, due process to date has been a govt lynch mob.
“At the time the Magna Carta was the solution to a political crisis in Medieval England but its importance has endured as it has become recognized as a cornerstone of liberty influencing much of the civilized world.
Only four copies of Magna Carta dating from 1215 have survived the ravages of time and Salisbury Cathedral is proud to be home to the best preserved original manuscript. Elias of Dereham, priest and steward of the archbishop of Canterbury is thought to have brought Salisbury’s copy of to Old Sarum in the days following the events at Runnymede and it has remained in the Cathedral’s care ever since.
Research by Victorian historians showed that the original 1215 charter had concerned the medieval relationship between the monarch and the barons, rather than the rights of ordinary people, but the charter remained a powerful, iconic document, even after almost all of its content was repealed from the statute books in the 19th and 20th centuries.
Magna Carta still forms an important symbol of liberty today, often cited by politicians and campaigners, and is held in great respect by the British and American legal communities, Lord Denning describing it as “the greatest constitutional document of all times – the foundation of the freedom of the individual against the arbitrary authority of the despot”.”
“Irony of ironies: the two wanted to visit Old Sarum and the Salisbury cathedral, not realizing the Magna Carta is today is a joke”
Great find!
Another remarkable touch of irony, Tom. The location of the remaining original copy of magna carta is the scene of an operation that seeks to put an end to the notion of habeus corpus.
oh i see, yet another politician advancing himself through the misfortune of others. The two guys have good reason to be nervous and scared of both the UK and Russia, whether innocent or not they have become pawns in a ruthless game.
he is kinda social-democrat from a middle level of russian politics. Not very opposed to putin, but to current “too capitalists politics and oligarchs”. they mentioned him imho just to emphasis that even public politicians are threatening them. that’s why they are asking protection.
O/T A missive from BLiar, passed on to me, which shows his vile colours.
‘One of the core objectives of my Institute is the promotion of co-existence. Religious extremism – both the violence and the underlying ideology that drives it – is a major barrier to this.
Today, my Institute is publishing its first annual Global Extremism Monitor (GEM) report**, an analysis of violent Islamist extremism in 2017.’
** https://institute.global/insight/co-existence/violent-islamist-extremism-global-problem?
Signed ACL Blair
Warmonger Extraordinaire
Tony Blair Institute for Global Change
He delivered his rot in Washington today. Where else? At the Council for Foreign Relations.
Note those familiar neuro linguistic skills he possesses – all his hand movements and gestures.
https://www.cfr.org/event/battling-global-extremism-what-next
Hum! There’s a flaw there. Let us apply common sense to the matter. This Thaddeus Sholto WAS with his brother; there WAS a quarrel; so much we know. The brother is dead and the jewels are gone. So much also we know. No one saw the brother from the time Thaddeus left him. His bed had not been slept in. Thaddeus is evidently in a most disturbed state of mind. His appearance is–well, not attractive. You see that I am weaving my web round Thaddeus. The net begins to close upon him.
There is still a lack of any “hard” evidence against these two guys, whoever they maybe, without linking them to the actual novichok used in Salisbury. The photographic evidence would only put them as “persons of interest” if it wasn’t for the supposed positive result of novichok in their hotel room, perhaps several months after their visit. What else do the UK authorities have to confidently assume they are GRU agents? Surely these two men would still be emitting traces of novichock themselves if they had been in such close contact with the perfume bottle and hotel room, or be suffering from their exposure. If the Russian and UK governments actually agreed to work together on this they could either dismiss or prove these guys involvement quite quickly. Not sure that is ever likely to happen though!
I still do not understand why they would put up in a cheap Citystay hotel in East London when the purpose of their trip, we are told, was to visit Salisbury. They could stay overnight in somewhere nicer in Salisbury ,for no more money (and save on train fares) – all viewable on TripAdvisor – and have more time to spend in Salisbury and environs.
I also don’t understand the snide comment here about Salisbury ( disclaimer I do not and never have lived there but have visited several times.) It is a nice historic small city with plenty for the weekend visitor. Look at the Skripals’ last known movements :drinks in an historic old Inn, The Mill, followed by a meal at Zizz’s – modern Italian food – located in a historic house. What’s not to like?
What intrigues me is that the UK Secret Services, we are told, know their real identities. Who do they think they really are?
“A retired research scientist named by The Sun as Dr Chris Busby was held by police who had responded to concerns for the safety of a woman. Police sources confirmed a 73-year-old man had been detained under the explosives act.
Mr Busby is a regular expert for Russian state sponsored channel RT and has previously claimed Britain may be behind the Salisbury poisoning. The arrest is not thought to be connected to the nerve-agent attack on Russian double-agent Sergei Skripal.
Police become unwell at chemical weapons expert’s Devon home
https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2018/09/13/chemical-weapons-expert-arrested-police-taken-devon-home/
No. He is never used for CBW by anyone. He has been on BBC as much as RT. His expertise is on the health effects of internal ionising radiation. Busby was a scientific advisor to the Low Level Radiation Campaign. Even in that field, his views and self-published books are controversial.
“Following the 2011 Fukushima Daiichi nuclear disaster, Busby established a television and internet presence where he discussed the risks of ionizing radiation and the Japanese Government’s handling of the disaster. A Japanese language website marketed tests and a mineral supplement that Busby deceitfully advised could mitigate the effects of ingested radioisotopes.” [That’s strong language for wikipedia!]
Interesting. I have seen the chap on RT and thought he came across as somewhat eccentric but was someone who spoke with great clarity on the technical properties of nerve agents. But all I want to know is what on earth are “poorly husbanded home maintenance products”?
Washing up liquid. The wife just sent me out to buy some.
Two quick points.
I got a bit tired of reading here how homofobic Russia is. Whoever says so has been brainwashed successfully. To make such sweeping statement is also plain dumb. I am not Russian but I come from a similar culture. Homosexuality is not encouraged and its promotion to the minors is banned. Where is homofobia in that, or maybe you require a dictionary to work out what fobia means? Or you are just not allowed to have a different view of sexuality then the British?
Yes, the interview does look improvised and unconvincing, but only to those who have a Pavlov’s reflex to slick PR. If the interview was polished, you would all be screaming “Russian set up”. Just as with homofobia, there is no middle ground with you British, either it is unconvincing or it is another Putin’s set up.
This has not been the most intelligent debate online and I am out. But I will keep this mental image of a ripped off shirt next to the Skripal’s bench and spray painted “VLAD WAS HIER”. The decline of an empire is meant to be a tragedy, but the British one is going out with a comedy, better than late Benny Hill’s.
KIza, I feel for what you’re saying. I suspect ( I won’t mind being told I’m wrong here) Russians are by and large conservative (small c) and nationalistic. I’m still trying to get my head around some here being so pro-Scottish independence and pro-EU. I.e. pro-nationalism and pro-globalism at the same time.
I think some people are very confused, but that may just be me 😉
There was a good example of classical ‘conservative values’ the other day. Putin had just raised the retirement age from 60 [trumped by western press as proof of communism’s abject failure whereas the US proposes to raise it to 67 for the same reason, save money].
‘Our russian women are too delicate’ for later retirement and given a softer standard. In what western countries could a man say that without some woman knocking him flat on his arse?
Homophobia in Russia exists like it does in many countries. If it wasn’t an issue, there would be zero need for a european convention on human rights to preserves rights. Are these two guys married? Can they adopt and raise children? Can the spouse inherit an estate? Joint income tax with same deductions as heterosexual or metrosexual couple?
I am going to guess none of the above, not legal options in today’s Russia and not even on the table. Moscow is quite a ways from Amsterdam or San Francisco.
“Russians are by and large conservative (small c)…”
Following on from what you and Kiza (whom I agree with in her evaluations) have said, my feeling is that it COULD be that if they are indeed gay – and I suspect that is quite likely – it is not so much repercussions at government level that they are wary of, it is more likely to be that their own families aren’t aware or at least haven’t acknowledged that they are gay; they and their family might be stigmatised by friends and neighbours if the truth were known, and their families might even disown them.
Good point Borncynical. If you were in Amsterdam or San Francisco you’d definitely be more stigmatised if you came out as a conservative ;). For me, this clash of ideologies is where the battleground lies to a significant degree. Which was my point, which TS above appeared to miss entirely.
Anders Novichok
Evidence of course but more basically: they havent been in court for one.
People like you arent interested in that because you believe this is a conspiracy by Russia as the theory spread by UK gov goes.
“Dr Chris Busby on the Skripal Russia Poisoning affair” Published on 6 Apr 2018
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=J4utEI2EU64
Got arrested today
https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-6163967/Home-British-nuclear-expert-appears-Russia-Today-raided-police.html
UK looking increasingly like Soviet Russia ot Stasi run East Germany
Who’s next?
Tony
“Incident is not being linked to the attempted murder of former Russian spy Sergei Skripal and his daughter Yulia in Salisbury in March”
Yeah sure.
My take on all this is, the interview with the two lads was Putin’s gracious gesture to Mrs. May to enable her to finally wrap up her silly story and get on with more important matters.
There’s more in that kind of attitude –actual statesmanship– than the one-up-man ship that the likes of May would prefer.
Let’s hope he fares better than that other expert, Dr David Kelly.