International Relations Expert on UK Salisbury Assessment: ‘Accumulation of Fake News’
Sputnik – September 8, 2018
A meticulous decontaminating process is under way in the house in Salisbury where the former Russian spy Sergei Skripal and his daughter Yulia were attacked with a nerve agent. Sputnik spoke to Xavier Moreau, Journalist and Political Commentator, about this story.
Sputnik: The US, France, Germany and Canada have agreed with the UK’s assessment that Russia’s government “almost certainly” approved the Salisbury poisoning. What does this assessment mean for Russia?
Xavier: I think it won’t change anything because the relationship between the G6 and Russia is already very bad; so it is just a new accumulation of fake news and fake investigation on the Skirpal case.
Sputnik: Prosecutors in the UK believe there is sufficient evidence to charge the pair with offences including conspiracy to murder. Is there sufficient evidence to support Britain’s verdict
Xavier: Actually there is no evidence; it’s just pictures and some videos on the two men who were supposed to get a visa to come in the UK. We do not even know if they are Russian. They [the UK] have said that they are from the GRU, but why the GRU? Why not a group like the FSB – how do they know that you know? There was an argument that was pronounced by Maria Zakharova, Russia’s Foreign Ministry Spokeswoman that you are supposed to give data to get a British visa. So why has London not published this data? I am very surprised. London has had 6 months to produce a reliable story but what they have said is a very poorly written story…
Sputnik: Looking to the future, what effect will this have on relations between Russia and the west?
Xavier: Relations between Russia and the West is already very bad, so it couldn’t be much worse. In my opinion until the midterm election in the United States all the Atlantic anti-Russian forces will be try to shield these anti-Russian fallacies; so they will use everything they can find and Skripal is one of these operations. You can also for instance the Syrian Crisis, they can find out another fake chemical from the Syrian Army… you will see. Until the 6th of November, you will not hear anything positive about Russia.
See also:
Skripal Skeptics: Which Countries Didn’t Agree With UK’s Assessment of Case at UN
Britain Should Be in the Dock Over Skripal Saga, Not Russia
Strategic Culture Foundation | 07.09.2018
The latest announcement by British authorities of two named Russian suspects in connection with the alleged poison assassination of a former Russian spy and his daughter is more absurd drama in a long-running tawdry saga.
No verifiable evidence is ever presented, just more lurid innuendo and more refusal by the British authorities to abide by any due process and international norms of diplomacy. It is all scurrilous sound and fury aimed at smearing Russia.
This week, Britain’s Metropolitan Police released video shots of two alleged Russian men purporting to show them arriving at London’s Gatwick airport on March 2. Other video shots purport to show the same men walking the streets of Salisbury on March 3, the day before former Russian Sergei Skripal and his daughter Yulia were apparently stricken with a powerful nerve agent. The two would-be assassins then allegedly flew back to Moscow from London late on March 4.
One preposterous claim, among several by the British authorities, is that traces of the putative nerve poison Novichok were found in the London hotel room where the alleged Kremlin agents stayed. The incompetence of the two supposed super assassins beggars belief. More realistically clumsy, however, is the attempt by the British to lay an incriminating trail.
The day after the Met police announcement implicating the two Russian culprits, Britain’s Prime Minister Theresa May stood up in front of her parliament and claimed that the two individuals were members of Russian military intelligence, the GRU. Another British minister, Ben Wallace, accused Russian President Vladimir Putin of having personal responsibility for ordering the alleged assassination plot.
Then on Thursday Britain summoned the United Nations Security Council to hash over the lurid claims against Russia without providing any further substantiating details to back up the sensational accusations.
This is nothing other than more trial-by-media, a process of railroading allegations against Russia, not on any basis of legal due process, but simply by bluster and prejudice. The credulous British news media play a dutiful secondary role in giving the claims a semblance of credibility, instead of asking the gaping questions that are warranted.
As Vasily Nebenzia, Russia’s envoy to the UN, remarked, the whole aim of the British claims is to whip up more international anti-Russia frenzy and hysteria. No sooner had Britain unleashed its latest allegations, a joint statement was released by the United States, Canada, Germany and France supporting the British claims.
Britain is now calling for more punitive sanctions against Moscow just as it had triggered earlier this year when the Skripals apparently fell ill on a park bench in the southern English town of Salisbury. Some 28 countries have expelled Russian diplomats over those earlier and as-yet unfounded claims. More expulsions can thus be expected, with the intended effect of framing Russia as a pariah state.
The timing of this week’s twist in the Skripal saga seems pertinent. The US, Britain and France are threatening to launch military strikes on Syria just as the Syrian army and its Russian ally move to defeat the last-remaining stronghold of NATO-backed terror groups in that country, potentially bringing an end to the Western-backed criminal war for regime change against the Assad government in Damascus.
Last month, too, Germany’s Chancellor Angela Merkel held a productive, cordial summit with President Putin near Berlin, where the two leaders appeared to solidify a rapprochement over a crucial energy project between Russia the European Union.
The British government is also teetering on political implosion from the Brexit debacle and growing public contempt.
As Russia’s UN envoy Nebenzia further pointed out, how is it possible that the British prime minister can make the categorical claim that the two alleged Russian men in the video shots released this week are members of the GRU? Typically, she made the claim without providing any substantiating information.
This was the same kind of plucking from thin air that Theresa May performed only days after the Skripals were apparently poisoned in Salisbury on March 4. Again, back then, May stood in front of parliament and dramatically accused Russia of a state-sponsored assassination attempt. The British authorities have cast, and continue to cast, a verdict without any legal case. That verdict relies entirely on Russophobia and prejudice of Russian malfeasance.
Former British ambassador Craig Murray and other astute observers have noted that the latest video shots released by Britain’s counter-terrorism police are highly questionable. The images could have been easily fabricated with modern digital methods. They are not evidence of anything. Yet, suspiciously, the British authorities are in unseemly haste to make their sensational charges of Russian state culpability.
Moscow has condemned the reprehensible rhetoric used by the British prime minister and senior members of her cabinet in throwing grave allegations against the Russian leadership. Britain’s trashing of diplomatic norms is deplorable, befitting a rogue state that is itching for conflict.
The fact is that the British have spurned any normal legal attempt by Russia to access the supposed investigation in order to ascertain the nature of the alleged information incriminating Moscow. If Britain had a case, then why doesn’t it permit an independent assessment? Russia is being denigrated with foul accusations, and yet Moscow is denied the right to defend itself by being able to ascertain the information. The British technique is that of an inquisition making a mockery of legal standards.
Another salient fact is that the whereabouts of the Skripals is not known – six months after the alleged poisoning incident. Russia has been repeatedly denied consular contact with one of its citizens, Yulia Skripal, whose bizarre one-off appearance in a video, released by the British authorities three months ago, conveyed her wish to return to her homeland of Russia. Britain is violating the legal principle of habeas corpus.
Far from any evidence implicating Russia in a crime, the evidence so far points to the British authorities illegally detaining the Skripals for propaganda purpose. That nefarious purpose is clear: to demonize and delegitimize Russia as a sovereign state.
The Skripal saga and official British clowning around would be laughable if the consequences for international relations were not so dire.
The British authorities should be the ones in the dock, not Russia, to answer a case of forced abduction and incitement of international conflict.
Psychic Nikki Haley: If There Is a Future Chemical Weapons Attack, Assad Did It
By Caitlin JOHNSTONE | Medium | September 4, 2018
UN Ambassador and Clairvoyant Prognosticator of the Transmundane Nikki Haley has foreseen that, if there are any future chemical weapons attacks in the Syrian province of Idlib, it will most definitely be the Syrian government that is responsible and not the multiple terrorist factions in the area.
“If they want to continue to go the route of taking over Syria, they can do that,” said Nikki Haley at a UN press conference today, without explaining how a nation’s only recognized government can ‘take over’ the country it governs. “But they cannot do it with chemical weapons. They can’t do it assaulting their people. And we’re not gonna fall for it. If there are chemical weapons that are used, we know exactly who’s gonna use them.”
Haley was referring to the Syrian government’s impending push to complete its military campaign of recapturing its land from the terrorist factions and militias who, with extensive help from the US and its allies, have been holding communities hostage in a failed attempt to take over Syria. Her supernatural prophecy is just the latest in an increasingly bizarre string of claims being advanced by political figures and establishment media that the Assad government is planning to use chemical weapons to complete that campaign in Idlib.
Their narrative is that the Russian government’s warnings of a plot by the Al Qaeda-linked terrorist factions occupying the region to stage a chemical weapons attack and frame the Syrian government for it are actually just a preemptive “smoke screen” to allow them to get away with committing war crimes. When Haley said “we’re not gonna fall for it,” this is the ‘it’ she was referring to.
So let’s unpack that a bit. I’m going to propose two different possibilities to you, and you decide for yourself which one is the more likely event to occur in the future:
Possibility 1: The actual, literal terrorist factions occupying Idlib are on the cusp of defeat with nowhere to escape to. They know for a fact that the US and its allies have launched repeated attacks on the Syrian government following chemical weapons allegations without first waiting for an investigation into those allegations. They also know for a fact that multiple high level officials in the western alliance have stated they will carry out aggressive attacks against the Syrian government in retaliation for any perceived chemical weapons attacks, and, thanks to the public prognostications from Madame Haley’s crystal ball, they also know that the Syrian government has already been assigned blame for any such attack in advance. Knowing all of these things, with their backs against the wall with the absolute certainty that getting the western military alliance on their side is their last and only chance, they get their hands on some chemical weapons and kill some of the civilians they’ve captured.
Possibility 2: On the cusp of victory, the Assad government decides to do the one thing that risks a US-led regime change military intervention in order to accomplish the crucial strategic masterstroke of killing a few kids with chlorine or sarin in front of a bunch of White Helmets cameras.
While you are weighing those two options, consider for a moment the fact that the US and its allies have an extensive history of attempting to control who governs Syria, and indeed plotted to create a violent uprising exactly as it occurred in 2011. Not after the violence had already started, but years in advance.
This is not my opinion, and it is not a conspiracy theory. It is a known fact that you can verify for yourself:
- Here is a 2006 WikiLeaks cable in which the US government is seen exploring possible factions which could be incentivized to rise up against Assad, and ways in which psyops could be used to ensure widespread violence.
- Here is a declassified CIA memo from 1986 in which the Central Intelligence Agency is seen exploring ways in which sectarian tensions can be inflamed to provoke a violent uprising in Syria. Here is a useful article featuring excerpts from the memo showing some jarring parallels between what was being planned and what happened a quarter century later.
- Here is a video clip of General Wesley Clark naming Syria among the countries scheduled by the Pentagon for regime change in the wake of 9/11.
- Here is a video clip of the former Foreign Minister of France stating in plain language that he was informed by British government insiders in 2009 that a violent Syrian uprising was being planned, two years before the violence erupted.
- Here is an article featuring a video of the former Qatari Prime Minister stating that the US and its allies were involved in the violence from the very beginning.
- Here is an article from May of 2011 reporting on some of the extremely suspicious provocations that led to the outbreak of widespread violence. Here’s another from March 2011. Here’s another from December 2011.
You get the picture. If a man had documented his plans to murder his wife with an axe, and those plans were found after his wife turned up dead of axe wounds exactly as he’d planned them, and multiple people in the area said they’d heard him murdering her with an axe, the primary suspect in that case would not be the neighbor’s cat.
The violence in Syria was planned and orchestrated years in advance, and now hundreds of thousands of human beings are dead as a direct result. And these monsters are now pretending to be concerned about human rights?
No. Get out of Syria, you absolute ghouls. Everyone responsible for perpetrating and sustaining these horrors should spend the rest of their lives in a Hague cell. If there is a chemical weapons attack as the Syrian government moves to recapture Idlib, the last people anyone should believe is the psychopathic governments who are responsible for this catastrophe in the first place.
Skripals – The Mystery Deepens
By Craig Murray | September 6, 2018
The time that “Boshirov and Petrov” were allegedly in Salisbury carrying out the attack is all entirely within the period the Skripals were universally reported to have left their home with their mobile phones switched off.
A key hole in the British government’s account of the Salisbury poisonings has been plugged – the lack of any actual suspects. And it has been plugged in a way that appears broadly convincing – these two men do appear to have traveled to Salisbury at the right time to have been involved.
But what has not been established is the men’s identity and that they are agents of the Russian state, or just what they did in Salisbury. If they are Russian agents, they are remarkably amateur assassins. Meanwhile the new evidence throws the previously reported timelines into confusion – and demolishes the theories put out by “experts” as to why the Novichok dose was not fatal.
This BBC report gives a very useful timeline summary of events.
At 09.15 on Sunday 4 March the Skripals’ car was seen on CCTV driving through three different locations in Salisbury. Both Skripals had switched off their mobile phones and they remained off for over four hours, which has baffled geo-location.
There is no CCTV footage that indicates the Skripals returning to their home. It has therefore always been assumed that they last touched the door handle around 9am.
But 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.
“Boshirov and Petrov” plainly are of interest in this case. But only Theresa May stated they were Russian agents: the police did not, and stated that they expected those were not their real identities. We do not know who Boshirov and Petrov were. It appears very likely their appearance was to do with the Skripals on that day. But they may have been meeting them, outside the home. The evidence points to that, rather than doorknobs. Such a meeting might explain why the Skripals had turned off their mobile phones to attempt to avoid surveillance.
It is also telling the police have pressed no charges against them in the case of Dawn Sturgess, which would be manslaughter at least if the government version is true.
If “Boshirov and Petrov” are secret agents, their incompetence is astounding. They used public transport rather than a vehicle and left the clearest possible CCTV footprint. They failed in their assassination attempt. They left traces of novichok everywhere and could well have poisoned themselves, and left the “murder weapon” lying around to be found. Their timings in Salisbury were extremely tight – and British Sunday rail service dependent.
There are other possibilities of who “Boshirov and Petrov” really are, of which Ukrainian is the obvious one. One thing I discovered when British Ambassador to Uzbekistan was that there had been a large Ukrainian ethnic group of scientists working at the Soviet chemical weapon testing facility there at Nukus. There are many other possibilities.
Yesterday’s revelations certainly add to the amount we know about the Skripal event. But they raise as many new questions as they give answers.
Russia is not involved in Skripal case at any level – Kremlin
RT | September 6, 2018
Russia has nothing to do with the Skripal poisoning case at any level, Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov has said, slamming “unacceptable” British allegations.
“Neither Russia’s top leadership nor those with lower ranks, and no country’s officials, have had anything to do with the events in Salisbury,” Peskov said. He rebuffed UK Prime Minister Theresa May’s claim that the attack on the ex-double agent Sergei Skripal and his daughter was approved at “senior level of the Russian state.”
“Any accusations against Russian leadership are unacceptable,” the spokesman added.
On Wednesday, UK prosecutors named two “Russians” whom they accuse of poisoning the Skripals. May later claimed that the duo were officers of the Russian military intelligence agency GRU. Firing back, the Russian Foreign Ministry said the names and photos of the two men ‘do not mean anything’ to Moscow and called on London “to abandon making public accusations and media manipulations.”
If the UK wants Russia to take action, it should send an official request in the first place in accordance with existing agreements, Peskov stressed, noting that media reports and statemens in parliament cannot replace it.
“We need a request from the British side to check their [suspects’] identities, to give us legal grounds for the identity checks. There is a common practice [for it],” he told journalists. He stressed that from the very beginning Moscow offered cooperation on the case, but London has been reluctant to agree.
One of the main arguments leading the UK to repeat its “highly likely” mantra regarding Moscow’s involvement in the poisoning has been that the Novichok nerve agent – allegedly used in this case – could have only been produced by Russia. However, foreign specialists have long been familiar with the formula, which was developed by the Soviet Union.
The new “revelations,” however, are not more plausible that the previous ones, Charles Shoebridge, a security expert and a former British military officer, told RT. The simple fact that allegedly well-trained Russian intelligence specialists could have left behind so much evidence speaks for itself, he says.
“It seems very strange that these people have absolutely left what seems to be a very reckless and clear trail of evidence, which almost seems to be designed, or at least would almost inevitably lead to the conclusions that the police and the authorities have come to today, in other words that Russia [is] to blame,” he told RT.
Annie Machon, a former MI5 intelligence officer, said she doubts Russia’s alleged motive behind the Salisbury incident and that certain pieces of evidence reported by the media “may look pretty compelling but will never be tested in a real court of law.”
The Impossible Photo
By Craig Murray | September 5, 2018
Russia has developed an astonishing new technology enabling its secret agents to occupy precisely the same space at precisely the same time.
These CCTV images released by Scotland yard today allegedly show Alexander Petrov and Ruslan Boshirov both occupying exactly the same space at Gatwick airport at precisely the same second. 16.22.43 on 2 March 2018. Note neither photo shows the other following less than a second behind.
There is no physically possible explanation for this. You can see ten yards behind each of them, and neither has anybody behind for at least ten yards. Yet they were both photographed in the same spot at the same second.
The only possible explanations are:
1) One of the two is travelling faster than Usain Bolt can sprint
2) Scotland Yard has issued doctored CCTV images/timeline.
I am going with the Met issuing doctored images.
UPDATE
A number of people have pointed out a third logical possibility, that the photographs are not of the same place and they are coming through different though completely identical entry channels. The problem with that is the extreme synchronicity. You can see from the photos that the channel(s) are enclosed and quite long, and they would have had to enter different entrances to the channels. So it is remarkable they were at exactly the same point at the same time. Especially as one of them appears to be holding (wheeled?) luggage and one has only a shoulder bag.
I have traveled through Gatwick many times but cannot call to mind precisely where they are. Can anybody pinpoint the precise place in the airport? Before or after passport control? Before or after baggage collection? Before or after customs? The only part of the airport this looks like to me is shortly after leaving the plane after the bridge, and before joining the main gangway to passport control – in which case passengers are not split into separated channels at the stage this was taken. I can’t recall any close corridors as long as this after passport control. But I am open to correction.
Corbyn Summoned by MI5 for ‘Facts of Life’ Briefing on Terrorism – Reports
Sputnik – 02.09.2018
The head of the MI5, Andrew Parker, has reportedly invited Corbyn to a “facts of life” briefing on the real terrorist threats facing the country.
But Corbyn has postponed the meeting, which was scheduled for Tuesday, as he is expected to spend all day attending a meeting of Labour’s National Executive Committee as he battles to quell a storm over anti-Semitism that has engulfed his leadership.
“The subjects of the briefing would have included issues relating to the domestic security threat, counterterrorism, counter-espionage, Russia and returning foreign fighters,” The Sunday Times wrote, quoting intelligence sources.
This would have been the first time the Labour leader would have been briefed by the head of Britain’s domestic intelligence service, the newspaper wrote.
Jeremy Corbyn had been told he could bring along his chief advisor Seumas Milne and Labour’s shadow Home Secretary Diane Abbott to the briefing.
Another source told the newspaper that Britain’s security services have been “troubled” by some of Jeremy Corbyn’s statements on terrorism.
When speaking after last year’s bombing in Manchester, Corbyn suggested that it was London’s foreign policy, rather than jihadist ideology, that bears the blame for terrorist atrocities.
Corbyn and Milne have also questioned the veracity of the security services’ conclusion about Russia’s alleged involvement in the Skripals’ poisoning in March, with Milne saying that she found it “problematic” to trust the security services after the Blair government lied about the strength of the intelligence about alleged Iraqi weapons of mass destruction in the run-up to the US-led invasion of the Arab country in 2003.
US Threats to Strike Syria Won’t Stop Damascus From Idlib Op – Syrian FM
Sputnik – 02.09.2018
Following the liberation of Daraa in the south, Idlib remains the “world’s largest open prison” for some three million people and the last terrorist stronghold in Syria.
“Anything that is actively promoted by the US will not affect the determination of the Syrian people and Syrian army’s plans to clear Idlib and finally put an end to terrorism in Syria,” Syrian Foreign minister Walid Muallem said in an interview.
According to him, the US accusations about alleged plans regarding chemical attacks have become questionable in the eyes of public opinion and are just an excuse for a possible attack on Syria.
“We, the people and leadership of Syria, would like to end the conflict today, but the intervention of Western countries headed by the US makes it difficult,” Muallem said.
Muallem emphasized that the US presence in Syria is illegal and Washington can in no way justify it.
“The US presence has claimed the lives of thousands of Syrian and every time terrorists were besieged by the Syrian Arab Army, Washington provided them with protection. It became clear that Washington’s main objective was to prolong the crisis in Syria in the interests of Israel,” the minister said.
On August 22, US National Security Adviser John Bolton stated that Washington and its partners would respond in a “swift and appropriate manner” to any verified chemical weapons use in Idlib or elsewhere in Syria.
Separately, US State Department spokeswoman Heather Nauert said that the United States “will respond to any verified chemical weapons use in Idlib or elsewhere in Syria… in a swift and appropriate manner.”
The Russian Defense Ministry, when commenting on the situation, accused the US and its allies of attempting to use a chemical weapons provocation planned by militants in Idlib as a pretext to launch an attack on Syrian government forces.
In August, Russian officials warned of a conspiracy by terrorists to launch an alleged chemical attack in order to provoke Western retaliation against the Syrian government.
According to Russian Defense Ministry’s spokesman Maj. Gen. Igor Konashenkov, a group of militants, who had been prepared by the Olive Group, had conspired to stage the rescue of victims of a chemical weapons attack in Idlib.
After media reports alleging a chemical attack had been carried out in the Syrian city of Douma in April, Western countries immediately accused the Syrian government of being behind the attack.
Following the accusations, the US, the UK, and France launched over 100 missiles on multiple targets in the country in response to the alleged use of chemical weapons.
Damascus denied the accusations and said that the Jaish al-Islam terror group had staged the attack to encourage foreign intervention in Syria.
Lawyers Petition for 9/11 Grand Jury
Corbett Report Extras – August 31, 2018
Today we’re joined by Mick Harrison (and David Meiswinkle) of the Lawyers’ Committee for 9/11 Inquiry to discuss their recent petition to the U. S. Attorney in the Southern District of New York to convene a special grand jury into the unprosecuted federal crimes relating to the destruction of three World Trade Center Towers on September 11, 2001. We talk about the committee and its formation, the nature and powers of a special grand jury, and what legal options remain for those seeking justice for 9/11.
Show Notes and MP3: https://www.corbettreport.com/?p=27961
The 10 Main Holes in the Official Narrative on the Salisbury Poisonings: #6 – The Meal and The Drink
By Rob Slane | The Blog Mire | August 30, 2018
In the last two pieces, I have focused on the official timeline of events on March 4th, as stated by The Metropolitan Police on 17th March. In Part #4, I concentrated on the fact that the timeline has not been updated since 17th March to let us know what the Skripals were doing on the morning of 4th March, even though this information is both important and readily available. Then in Part #5, I focused on another very important event that occurred on the afternoon of 4th March, which has been omitted altogether from the timeline: the duck feed. Given that the duck feed occurred after the official narrative says the Skripals were poisoned, but before they went to Zizzis and The Mill, that piece of information alone is enough to completely discredit the official narrative. Which is perhaps why it has been left out.
I want to now focus on one last part of the timeline, which is not something that has been left out, as in the case of the missing 4 hours and the duck feed, but something that appears to have been inverted into the wrong order. Once again, let’s begin with the official timeline:
Saturday 3rd March
14.40hrs on Saturday 3 March: Yulia arrives at Heathrow Airport on a flight from Russia.
Sunday 4th March
09.15hrs on Sunday, 4 March: Sergei’s car is seen in the area of London Road, Churchill Way North and Wilton Road.
13.30hrs: Sergei’s car is seen being driven down Devizes Road, towards the town centre.
13:40hrs: Sergei and Yulia arrive in Sainsbury’s upper level car park at the Maltings. At some time after this, they go to the Bishops Mill Pub in the town centre.
14.20hrs: They dine at Zizzi Restaurant.
15:35hrs: They leave Zizzi Restaurant.
16.15hrs: Emergency services receive a report from a member of the public and police arrive at the scene within minutes, where they find Sergei and Yulia extremely ill on a park bench near the restaurant.
I noted in the previous piece that the timeline is astonishingly vague in places. No more is this so than regarding the visit to The Mill Pub. As a general rule, when there is such vagueness in an official timeline, it must either be because the information that might clarify things is not available, or because those producing the timeline are attempting to conceal something or detract attention.
Is the information available? Of course, and from a number of sources. Firstly, there are a number of CCTV cameras covering The Maltings, and no less than 12 in The Mill itself, all of which could be checked and the timestamps noted. Secondly, according to witnesses the Skripals are known to have ordered two glasses of white wine whilst in The Mill, and so the cash register or card payment would have registered the time of purchase. Thirdly, there were a number of witnesses who claimed to have seen the Skripals both in the pub and the restaurant. Fourthly, Sergei and Yulia’s phones could be tracked to see where they were and when, assuming they were traceable. And fifthly, as I have repeatedly pointed out, Sergei and Yulia are alive, apparently well, and so can be asked to fill in the details.
But if the information is there, why is the timeline so vague?
To answer that, I want to turn to some of the earlier reports, which rely on witness statements to piece together details about the Skripals’ movements. All of these reports appeared prior to the release of the Metropolitan Police’s timeline and, as you will see, there is something very striking about them:
“Sergei Skripal went for a drink with his daughter at 3pm at The Mill in Salisbury after eating at a Zizzi Italian restaurant. In the pub, they ordered two glasses of wine before Mr Skripal went to use the toilet. The witness, who did not want to be named, said that when he returned he appeared as if he was drunk. He said Mr Skripal and his daughter Yulia then left immediately without finishing their drinks.”
https://www.pressreader.com/uk/daily-mail/20180310/281625305816856
“It is not clear when the Skripals were confronted, having left a branch of Italian restaurant chain Zizzi between 2pm and 3pm. After leaving the restaurant, they are thought to have gone to a nearby a pub called The Mill. They were then seen walking through a shopping precinct and found on a bench overlooking the Avon shortly after 4pm.”
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-5473177/Woman-40s-taken-hospital.html
“The Skripals had eaten lunch in Italian restaurant chain Zizzi in the centre of Salisbury on Sunday. They are believed to have left between 2pm and 3pm and gone to a nearby pub called The Mill before being found later on a bench overlooking the Avon.”
https://www.standard.co.uk/news/uk/emergency-services-called-to-building-next-to-zizzi-restaurant-at-centre-of-russian-spy-poison-plot-a3784031.html
“A witness told detectives he saw a man with a black mask covering his nose and mouth acting suspiciously around 3pm last Sunday. At the time Mr Skripal and Yulia were thought to be in the Mill pub a few yards away.”
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-5486163/Fears-Russian-spy-poisoned-bouquet-flowers.html
“Witnesses have said that after eating at Zizzi’s restaurant they went to the Mill pub where Mr Skripal appeared unsteady on his feet, as if “drunk” – even though he had only ordered a single glass of white wine – suggesting the effects of the nerve agent were rapidly taking effect.”
https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2018/03/10/poisoned-police-officer-not-hero-just-job/
“Officers yesterday took CCTV from inside The Mill. They had gone into The Mill pub following a meal in a Zizzi restaurant.”
https://www.thesun.co.uk/news/5742937/cops-hunt-blonde-woman-seen-on-cctv-20-mins-before-ex-russian-spy-spy-sergei-skripal-and-daughter-yulia-were-poisoned/
“Steve Cooper, who was at the Mill pub with his wife and dog for a couple of hours last Sunday afternoon, told the BBC he was outraged. Some of his friends, who had been in the pub at the same time and seen Mr Skripal head to the toilet, could not remember what they had been wearing that day, he added. https://www.bbc.com/news/uk-43362673
When was Mr Cooper in The Mill? Here’s what he said in an interview with ITV:
‘We’d been sitting on the very bench at around 3pm and then moved onto The Mill Pub and left there at 4:45pm where we saw the air ambulance.’”
https://www.facebook.com/itvnewsmeridian/videos/1699234906804241/
In fact, there are three very striking things about these reports:
- Firstly, they all contradict the official timeline by stating that Sergei and Yulia Skripal went to Zizzis first, then on to The Mill.
- Secondly, a number of them suggest that the Skripals were in the pub at around 3pm, rather than between 1:40 and 2:20, as the official timeline suggests.
- Thirdly, they are based on the testimony of witnesses, whereas I have yet to see a single witness statement that backs up the order of events suggested in the official timeline.
But if those reports leave you unpersuaded that the Skripals visited Zizzis first, followed by The Mill, there is more. In this early report in The Times, not only is the sequence stated as Zizzis then The Mill, but there is also an interesting detail. It is said that the Skripals left Zizzis 45 minutes after arriving, before going onto The Mill:
“Within 45 minutes the pair had left and it is assumed that they took the short stroll to The Mill.”
https://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/russian-spy-sergei-skripal-was-easy-to-find-at-pub-restaurant-or-railway-club-t80jfbjxm
This same detail was mentioned in another article, this time in The Mail, which carried the following statement by another witness:
“He was going absolutely crazy, I didn’t understand it and I couldn’t understand him. They had not been seen for a little while by the front of house staff, but I think it was more than that. He just wanted his food and to go. He was just shouting and losing his temper. I would have asked him to leave. He just said, “I want my food and my bill”. ‘The waiter took him the bill at the same time as the main course, which was unusual. I don’t think they paid all of the bill. I think they were given a discount because he was so angry and agitated. He had to wait about 20 minutes for his main course. I think it was easier for the staff just to give him money to leave as he was so angry. They were sitting by themselves at the back of the restaurant but I think people were pleased when they left. They were only there for about 45 minutes. It was a quick lunch. He just wanted to get out of there. She was silent, perhaps embarrassed.”
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-5470455/How-poisoned-spy-plot-unfolded-Salisbury.html
Notice how this 45 minutes does not fit into the official timeline. There it is said that they arrived at Zizzis at 14:20 and left at 15:35. By my reckoning, this is 75 minutes. Not 45. And in any case, the 75 minutes would make a nonsense of his apparent agitation at having to wait 20 minutes for his main course.
Put all this together and what can we say?
Firstly: we can be confident that the original reports, based on various witness statements and all claiming that the Skripals went to Zizzis first and then The Mill, are accurate.
Secondly: we can therefore be confident that the official timeline, which places the visit to The Mill before the visit to Zizzis, but which is backed up by no public witness statements, is wrong.
Thirdly: we can construct our own timeline of that part of the day, which although not official, and differing from the official timeline, does at least have the benefit of getting things in the right order:
13:40hrs: Sergei and Yulia arrive in Sainsbury’s upper level car park at the Maltings.
13:45hrs: Sergei is seen on CCTV feeding ducks near the Avon Playground, and handing bread to three boys, none of whom seem to have been affected by a nerve agent.
13:50-14:00hrs: The Skripals enter Zizzi Restaurant.
14:35-14:45hrs: They leave Zizzis and walk to The Bishops Mill Pub.
All of which begins to answer the question of why the official timeline is so vague. It is vague because the order of events it posits is incorrect. Furthermore – and I’m sorry to say that I can think of no other plausible reason, given the “cloud of witnesses” mentioned above – it is vague because the order of events it suggests is deliberately incorrect. That is, it appears that a decision has been taken to ignore all the early reports, and to discard all that witness testimony, and instead to advance a timeline that is based on no public witness statements, using the vague and woolly statement, “At some time after this, they go to the Bishops Mill Pub in the town centre”.
Which raises a number of important questions:
- Why have investigators ignored a large number of reports and witness statements, and have instead produced a timeline that is not backed up by any public testimony?
- Why have the media organisations who came up with the Zizzis to Mill order of events after speaking to witnesses, not questioned the Metropolitan Police timeline and its implication that their reports were “fake news”?
- Why do those who constructed the timeline seem so keen to avoid people concluding what the early reports state, which is that after leaving Zizzis, the Skripals were in The Mill at around 3pm?
The 10 Main Holes in the Official Narrative on the Salisbury Poisonings: #1 – The Motive
The 10 Main Holes in the Official Narrative on the Salisbury Poisonings: #2 – The Intent
The 10 Main Holes in the Official Narrative on the Salisbury Poisonings: #3 – The Capability
The 10 Main Holes in the Official Narrative on the Salisbury Poisonings: #4 – The Missing Four Hours
The 10 Main Holes in the Official Narrative on the Salisbury Poisonings: #6 – The Meal and The Drink
Syria Presents Proof on Chemical Weapons Terror Attack Preparations – UN Envoy
Sputnik – August 30, 2018
Late last week, Russian Defense Ministry spokesman Igor Konashenkov said that the White Helmets group plans to film videos for Middle Eastern and English-language media outlets after staging a false-flag chemical weapons attack in Syria in order to further destabilize the war-torn country.
Damascus has handed documents to the UN to prove that al-Nusra Front terrorists plan to conduct a chemical weapons attack in the northwestern Syrian province of Idlib and point the finger at the country’s government, according to Syria’s UN envoy Bashar Jaafari.
Iran’s Fars news agency cited Jaafari as saying that any aggression against Syria “would be an aggression against a United Nations founding state, as well as against global peace and security, and would amount to supporting terrorism.”
He recalled that Syria did not have chemical weapons, reiterating Damascus’ adherence to its obligations related to the Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW).
Jaafari emphasized that Damascus condemns any use of chemical weapons and considers it “to be immoral.”
His statement came after Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Sergey Ryabkov said that Moscow had urged Germany and the US to influence the armed opposition in Syria’s Idlib province amid possible provocations pertaining to the use of chemical weapons in the area.
Ryabkov referred to the al-Nusra Front, which he suggested was plotting “a very serious provocation” in the Idlib area with the use of chemical weapons. According to him, the White Helmets group in Syria will film a video of this “chemical weapons attack” in order for the US and its allies to use it as a pretext for massive airstrikes on Syria.
Earlier, Alexei Kondratyev, deputy chair of the Russian Upper House’s Defense and Security Committee, told Sputnik that Moscow was concerned about Washington’s military build-up in the Mediterranean near the Syrian coast.
“The United States is strengthening its naval task force in the Mediterranean Sea not far from Syria. This is done to prepare for the strike. So, it should be expected that in the event of a provocation and a decision to deliver strikes against Syria, the missiles will be launched both from the air, and from the sea,” he pointed out.
Kondratyev made the remarks as USS The Sullivans, a destroyer with 56 cruise missiles on board, arrived in the Persian Gulf late last week, while a US В-1В bomber carrying 24 air-to-surface cruise missiles was deployed at Al Udeid air base in Qatar.
While the White Helmets, a Syrian humanitarian non-government organization, claims to have saved tens of thousands of lives, Moscow and Damascus insist that the group had ties with terrorists and extremists.
On April 14, the US, Britain and France launched 103 cruise and air-to-surface missiles at government facilities in Syria, in response to the alleged April 7 chemical attack in the Damascus suburb of Douma. Most of the missiles were intercepted by Syrian air defenses.Russia’s President Vladimir Putin denounced the missile strikes as an act of aggression against a sovereign country as neither Russian experts nor local residents in Douma confirmed that any chemical attack had actually taken place there.
Last Sunday, Syrian Ambassador to Russia Riyad Haddad confirmed that Damascus eliminated all of its chemical arsenal in 2013 and that Syria “never used and will not use chemical weapons.”
READ MORE:
State Department Says US Will Respond to Chemical Weapons Use in Idlib, Syria
Macron: France Ready to Conduct New Strikes on Syria if Chemical Weapons Used
Syria Got Rid of Chemical Weapons, OPCW Confirmed Destruction — Russian FM
The 10 Main Holes in the Official Narrative on the Salisbury Poisonings: #5 – The Feeding of the Ducks
By Rob Slane | The Blog Mire | August 27, 2018
In the previous piece, I began to focus on the official timeline of events on March 4th, as stated by The Metropolitan Police on 17th March, noting that there is a missing 4 hours in the morning, which investigators were very anxious to receive information on at the time, but which they have been conspicuously silent on since. Not only have they failed to update the timeline with information about the Skripals movements on the morning of 4th March, but they have failed to do so despite now having that information. How can I be sure they have it? Because both Sergei and Yulia Skripal have been awake and talking for months now.
But in this piece, I want to focus on something even more important. Something that is crucial for two reasons:
- Firstly, the Metropolitan Police do not mention it in their timeline, even though it absolutely did happen and is vital.
- Secondly, it completely demolishes the theory that the Skripals were poisoned by touching a nerve agent on the handle of Mr Skripal’s front door.
The incident in question is the duck feed. But before I come on to it, let’s just remind ourselves of the official timeline once more, so that we can then see where this incident fits in:
Saturday 3rd March
14.40hrs on Saturday 3 March: Yulia arrives at Heathrow Airport on a flight from Russia.
Sunday 4th March
09.15hrs on Sunday, 4 March: Sergei’s car is seen in the area of London Road, Churchill Way North and Wilton Road.
13.30hrs: Sergei’s car is seen being driven down Devizes Road, towards the town centre.
13:40hrs: Sergei and Yulia arrive in Sainsbury’s upper level car park at the Maltings. At some time after this, they go to the Bishops Mill Pub in the town centre.
14.20hrs: They dine at Zizzi Restaurant.
15:35hrs: They leave Zizzi Restaurant.
16.15hrs: Emergency services receive a report from a member of the public and police arrive at the scene within minutes, where they find Sergei and Yulia extremely ill on a park bench near the restaurant.
One of the things that is immediately obvious about this timeline is its astonishing vagueness in certain places. For instance, Mr Skripal’s car was apparently seen in three different areas — London Road, Churchill Way North and Wilton Road — at 9:15. Presumably it was seen on CCTV cameras in these locations, and presumably these cameras all have time and date stamps. In which case, why could the timeline not be more precise than suggesting that Mr Skripal’s car was at three locations at the same time?
But the vagueness of the time and location of the car in the morning really is small fry compared to the time and location given at 13:40hrs:
“Sergei and Yulia arrive in Sainsbury’s upper level car park at the Maltings. At some time after this, they go to the Bishops Mill Pub in the town centre.”
At some time after this? What exactly is that supposed to mean? Were there not CCTV cameras in The Maltings and in The Mill that could give a more precise timeline? The unnerving thing – given that this is one of the biggest and most important investigations Britain has ever seen – is that yes indeed there were. And yet what these cameras show has either been ignored in the timeline altogether, or incorporated into it in some sort of vague and nebulous way that – and I don’t know how else to process it – frankly looks very suspect.
I’ll come on to the bit about The Mill in the next piece, but before we get there, perhaps we can jog the memories of investigators by reminding them of a piece of CCTV footage that they certainly do have, which is time stamped, and which shows clearly where Sergei Skripal and Yulia were at a particular time.
After parking the car, at 1:40pm, the two of them were seen near the Avon Playground, in The Maltings, feeding ducks with some local boys. This was at 1:45pm and has been confirmed to me by one of the boys’ mothers, who was shown the CCTV footage by the police, which she said was really clear. She also confirmed to me that Mr Skripal was wearing jeans and a leather jacket, and that Yulia Skripal had a red bag.
The Metropolitan Police apparently don’t think the duck feeding incident important enough to include in their timeline, and so after the parking of the car, we are treated to the vague statement that, “at some time after this, they go to the Bishops Mill Pub.”
But it is incredibly important, for the following reason: it totally, completely and comprehensively debunks the idea that Mr Skripal was poisoned at his home, after his hand came into contact with a deadly nerve agent on the handle of his front door. Why?
BECAUSE HE HANDED BREAD TO THE BOYS, AND NONE OF THEM BECAME CONTAMINATED, THAT’S WHY!
Think about it. Zizzis has remained shut since the incident, because it was apparently contaminated, and the table that the Skripals ate their meal at “had to be destroyed” because of the apparently high concentration of nerve agent there. Likewise, The Mill has been closed ever since. And of course the bench too had to be destroyed, since it was apparently contaminated.
But these were all places visited by the Skripals AFTER the feeding of the ducks.
And so we are asked to believe the following preposterous notion: That Sergei and Yulia Skripal’s hands were contaminated with “military grade nerve agent” at the door of Mr Skripal’s house, so much so that certain places they visited on that afternoon had to undergo months of decontamination, and certain items they touched had to be destroyed.
And yet in between getting the nerve agent on their hands at the door, and the visits to those locations, Mr Skripal was seen on CCTV, at 1:45pm, handing bread to local boys to give to the ducks. With his contaminated hands, apparently. And one of those boys even ate a piece. And yet none of those boys managed to become contaminated the by the “military grade nerve agent” on Mr Skripal’s hands?
No amount of “they might have been wearing gloves” will do. Firstly, the temperature was actually quite warm (8-9 degrees) and so it’s unlikely that they were wearing gloves; secondly, who actually tears bread from a loaf whilst wearing gloves (probably nobody, is my guess); but thirdly, gloves apparently weren’t enough protection to prevent D.S. Bailey from becoming contaminated, allegedly at the door handle.
No, there is no way out of this. The duck feeding incident leaves the “nerve agent on the door handle” theory in tatters. If the duck feed happened – which it did – then the “Skripals becoming contaminated with nerve agent on the door handle” did not happen. To continue to believe that it did, in the light of Mr Skripal handing bread to boys, not one of whom became contaminated, is to cast off all reason and enter a twilight world of the absurd.
But it does at least explain why the incident doesn’t make it onto the timeline!
The 10 Main Holes in the Official Narrative on the Salisbury Poisonings: #1 – The Motive
The 10 Main Holes in the Official Narrative on the Salisbury Poisonings: #2 – The Intent
The 10 Main Holes in the Official Narrative on the Salisbury Poisonings: #3 – The Capability
The 10 Main Holes in the Official Narrative on the Salisbury Poisonings: #4 – The Missing Four Hours
The 10 Main Holes in the Official Narrative on the Salisbury Poisonings: #6 – The Meal and The Drink
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Fact File : Civilian Internment 1939 – 1945
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Internment of civilian nationals belonging to opposing sides was carried out in varying degrees by all belligerent powers in World War Two. It was also the fate of those servicemen who found themselves in a neutral country.
At the outbreak of war there were around 80,000 potential enemy aliens in Britain who, it was feared, could be spies, or willing to assist Britain’s enemies in the event of an invasion. All Germans and Austrians over the age of 16 were called before special tribunals and were divided into one of three groups… continue
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