UK authorities denying access to Skripal’s daughter: Russian embassy
RT | March 30, 2018
Russia’s embassy in the UK criticized the “hypocrisy” of British authorities who always demand access to their subjects abroad but have prevented diplomats from visiting the Russian daughter of former double agent Sergei Skripal.
The diplomats have consistently requested that UK authorities provide access to a hospital where Yulia Skripal, a Russian citizen and the daughter of former double agent Sergei Skripal, is undergoing medical treatment, but to no avail so far, the Russian Embassy told Interfax news agency on Friday.
“We do understand that various British services are dealing with Russian citizens, but we don’t have any information on what is happening in the hospital,” the embassy said, adding that the diplomatic mission was informed on March 29 that Skripal’s daughter was recovering, but it was barred from visiting her.
“It is hard not to mention hypocrisy of British authorities who demand access to bearers of UK passports on every occasion but deprive Russia of such right,” the Russian mission noted.
Yulia Skripal permanently resides in Russia and came to the UK for several days.
“It is every embassy’s responsibility to render assistance, including legal assistance, to Russians who got in trouble. Unfortunately, the British side blocks us from carrying out that function,” the embassy said.
Not only was Skripal’s daughter denied consular assistance, the former double agent’s niece Viktoria also contacted the embassy in hopes of getting an update on the status of her relatives.
“Unfortunately, we could not inform her because of UK’s position,” the embassy said. Skripal’s niece is willing to come to London, and it is essential that British authorities issue a visa for her “on humanitarian grounds” as soon as possible.
Four weeks after the Salisbury incident, it emerged that Yulia Skripal’s condition finally appeared to be improving. The good news came only one day after detectives revealed to the public that the Skripals might have been attacked in their own home, as the highest concentration of chemicals was found by experts on the front door of their house on Christie Miller Road.
Shortly after the incident, London was quick to point the finger at Russia over the attack on the Skripals. Moscow has repeatedly denied complicity in the poisoning.
‘UK makes light sabers, Russia makes Novichok,’ Johnson brags – but what about Saudi weapons sales?
RT | March 29, 2018
Foreign Secretary Boris Johnson bragged about the UK’s cultural influence, claiming its “arsenals” carried the “power of imagination.” The bold statement came from a principle facilitator of civilian deaths in Yemen.
Speaking at the Lord Mayor’s Easter Banquet in London, Johnson had a message to deliver: despite withdrawing from the EU, Britain remains a global team player and a stalwart defender of the ideals-based rule of law. Unlike Russia, which he described as a bad actor in all too many regards, Britain is apparently a bastion of commerce, science and culture.
“We have the most vibrant and dynamic cultural scene, with one venue – the British Museum – attracting more visitors than 10 whole European countries that it would not be tactful to name tonight,” Johnson said.
The jibe’s targets were quite apparent, since earlier in his speech Johnson had named every nation that backed the UK in its drive to expel Russian diplomats over the Skripal poisoning affair – “the full roll of honor,” he called it. He didn’t mention that the absentees in the list probably didn’t have the opportunities to plunder their foreign colonies for decades to fill their museums, unlike Britain.
The poisoning of Sergei Skripal and his daughter Yulia is seen by the UK government as a closed case, with Russia the undisputed culprit – despite the police probe being in the early stages. London pushed for an unprecedentedly large expulsion of Russian diplomats, with the US accounting for the biggest chunk of people kicked out.
Johnson’s cultural superiority bragging continued, when he cited “an astonishing fact that both of the two highest grossing movies in the world last year was either shot or produced in this country: ‘Beauty and the Beast’ and ‘Star Wars.’”
“And that tells you all you need to know about the difference between modern Britain and the government of Vladimir Putin. They make Novichok, we make light sabers,” the foreign secretary said, referring to the nerve agent reportedly used in the poisoning.
“I tell you that the arsenals of this country and of our friends are not stocked with poison but with something vastly more powerful: the power of imagination and creativity and innovation that comes with living in a free society, of a kind you see all around you today,” Johnson added.
There are many countries that have experienced firsthand the power of British “imagination and creativity,” including Iraq, Libya, Syria and Yemen in this century alone. But not the kind Johnson spoke about. Just last month, the foreign secretary and the cabinet he is part of were welcoming Saudi Arabia’s crown prince and de facto ruler Mohammad bin Salman as he visited the country.
READ MORE: 3 years of Yemen bloodbath marked by US & UK arms deals with Saudis
Riyadh is among the biggest buyers of British arms, including bombs, which it uses to hit all sorts of targets in Yemen. The strikes include civilian factories, marketplaces and funeral ceremonies, which has been harschly condemned by rights groups. While brushing off responsibility for some of the cases entirely, the Saudis tend to write off others as errors or unavoidable collateral damage, so the British government doesn’t seem to be particularly bothered that UK weapons kill civilians in Yemen.
Johnson praised the UK-manufactured light sabers, which make a “mysterious buzz” to inspire children and help the country stand against Russia in a company of “admirers and friends.” Somehow the arsenals it sells to Saudi Arabia, fueling the kingdom’s three-year bloodbath in Yemen, didn’t make their way into the speech.
Moscow calls for meeting of OPCW on April 2 over ex-spy Skripal poisoning
RT | March 29, 2018
Moscow is calling for a meeting of the Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPWC) on April 2 to have “an honest conversation” on the Skripal case, Sergey Lavrov, Russia’s Foreign Minister, said.
Moscow suggested convening a meeting of the OPCW executive council on April 2, where it will bring up all questions, Lavrov said adding that if “our Western partners” dodge this, then it will be further “evidence” that everything that’s happened is a “provocation.”
The FM again refuted Britain’s accusations against Russia over poisoning the former double agent, saying that “never before have we witnessed such mockery of international law.”
According to Lavrov, Britain has no interest in establishing the truth in the Skripal case.
20 More Questions That Journalists Should be Asking About the Skripal Case
By Rob Slane | The BlogMire | March 27, 2018
To my knowledge, none of the questions I wrote in my previous piece – 30 questions That Journalists Should be Asking About the Skripal Case – has been answered satisfactorily, at least not in the public domain. Yet despite the fact that these legitimate questions have not yet been answered, and many important facts surrounding the case are still unknown, the case has given rise to a serious international crisis, with the extraordinary expulsion of Russian diplomats across many EU countries and particularly the United States on March 26th.
This is a moment to stop and pause. A man and his daughter were poisoned in the City of Salisbury on 4th March. Yet despite the fact that investigators do not yet appear to know how they were poisoned, when they were poisoned, or where they were poisoned, a number of Western nations have used the incident as a pretext for the co-ordinated expulsion of diplomats on a scale not witnessed even during the height of the Cold War. These are clearly very abnormal and very dangerous times.
I pointed out in my previous piece that it is not my intention to advance some sort of conspiracy theory on this blog. It remains the case that I simply don’t have any holistic theory — “conspiracy” or otherwise — for who carried this out, and I continue to retain an open mind. But since the Government of my country has rushed to judgement without many of the facts of the case being established, and since this has led to the biggest deterioration in relations between nuclear-armed nations since the Cuban Missile Crisis, it seems to me that it is more important than ever to keep asking questions in the hope that answers will come.
And so, for what it’s worth, here are 20 more important questions that I think that journalists ought to be asking regarding this case:
1. Have the police yet identified any suspects in the case?
2. If so, is there any evidence connecting them to the Russian Government?
3. If not, how is it possible to determine culpability, as the British Government has done?
4. In her statement to the House of Commons on 12th March 2018, the British Prime Minister, Theresa May stated the following:
“It is now clear that Mr Skripal and his daughter were poisoned with a military-grade nerve agent of a type developed by Russia. This is part of a group of nerve agents known as ‘Novichok’. Based on the positive identification of this chemical agent by world-leading experts at the Defence Science and Technology Laboratory at Porton Down” [my emphasis added].
In the judgement at the High Court on 22nd March on whether to allow blood samples to be taken from Sergei and Yulia Skripal for examination by the Organisation for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW), evidence submitted by Porton Down to the court (Section 17 i) stated the following:
“Blood samples from Sergei Skripal and Yulia Skripal were analysed and the findings indicated exposure to a nerve agent or related compound. The samples tested positive for the presence of a Novichok class nerve agent or closely related agent” [my emphasis added].
So the Prime Minister said that Porton Down had positively identified the substance as a Novichok nerve agent. The statement from Porton Down says that their tests indicated that it was a Novichok agent or closely related agent. Are these two statements saying exactly the same thing?
5. Why were the phrases “related compound” and “closely related agent” added to the statement given by Porton Down, and is this an indication that the scientists were not 100% sure that the substance was a “Novichok” nerve agent?
6. Why were these phrases left out of the Prime Minister’s statement to the House of Commons?
7. Why did the Prime Minister choose to use the word “Novichok” in her speech, rather than the word Foliant, which is the actual name of the programme initiated by the Soviet Union when attempting to develop a new class of chemical weapons in the 1970s and 1980s?
8. When asked in an interview with Deutsche Welle how scientists at Porton Down had found out so quickly that the nerve agent was of the “Novichok” class of chemical weapons, the Foreign Secretary, Boris Johnson, was asked whether Porton Down possesses samples of it. Here is how he replied:
“They do. And they were absolutely categorical and I asked the guy myself, I said, ‘Are you sure?’ And he said there’s no doubt” [My emphasis].
If Mr Johnson’s statement is correct, and the Defence Science and Technology Laboratory (DSTL) at Porton Down has samples of “Novichok” in its possession, where did they come from?
9. Were they produced at Porton Down?
10. How long have they had them?
11. Why has the DSTL not registered possession of these substances with the OPCW, which it is legally obliged to do under the Chemical Weapons Convention (CWC)?
12. Does this admission by Mr Johnson not indicate that “Novichoks” can be made in any advanced chemical weapons facility, as indeed they were under the auspices of the OPCW in Iran in 2016?
13. If so, how can the Government be sure that the substance used to poison Mr Skripal and his daughter was made in or produced by Russia?
14. In her statement to the House of Commons on Wednesday 14th March, the British Prime Minister stated that there were only two plausible explanations for poisoning of Mr Skripal and his daughter:
“Either this was a direct act by the Russian State against our country. Or conceivably, the Russian government could have lost control of a military-grade nerve agent and allowed it to get into the hands of others.”
Other than the actual substance used, is there any hard evidence that led the Government to conclude these as being the only two plausible scenarios?
15. On March 26th, a number of countries expelled Russian diplomats in an apparent response to the incident in Salisbury. Yet at this time, the OPCW had not yet investigated the case, nor analysed blood samples. Why was the clearly co-ordinated decision to expel diplomats taken before the OPCW’s investigation had concluded?
16. Has this not put huge pressure on the OPCW to come up with “the right” conclusion?
17. It is reckoned that the OPCW’s investigation into the substance used will take at least three weeks to complete, whereas it took Porton Down less than a week to analyse it. What accounts for this difference?
18. Will the OPCW be using the samples of “Novichok” that Boris Johnson says are held at Porton Down to compare with the blood samples of Mr Skripal and his daughter?
19. If not, on what basis will this comparison be made, since the first known synthesis of a “Novichok” was made by Iran in 2016?
20. If the OPCW discovers that the substance is indeed a “Novichok”, will this be sufficient evidence with which to establish who carried out the attack on the Skripals or — given that other countries clearly have the capability to produce such substances — would more evidence be needed?
Jeremy, Get on your Knees!
By Gilad Atzmon | March 29, 2018
In their response to Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn, the Jewish Leadership Council (JLC) and the Board of Deputies of British Jews (BOD) claim to ‘propose an agenda of actions for discussion’ between the Labour party and those who claim to ‘represent’ British Jews.
In practice the two Zionist institutions have managed to produce one of the most disgusting documents in modern Jewish history. A text that is little more than an ode to the self-defamation of its own authors and to the community they claim to ‘represent’: it is rude, authoritarian, and disrespectful to a democratically elected leader of Europe’s biggest party.
Read the BOD/JLC’s public address to Corbyn here
When you read some of the extracts below, remember that despite BOD and the JLC claims to ‘represent’ British Jewry, these two organisations managed to pull just 1500 members of their community into their ‘Enough is Enough’ anti-Corbyn demonstration earlier this week. We are talking about 0.5% of British Jewry. The BOD/JLC’s authoritarian document outlines a set of humiliating conditions for Corbyn to meet. The text proves how detached these Jewish institutions are from British values, specifically, and the Western ethos, in general. In fact their vision of the political arena is Orwellian in nature and tyrannical in practice.
Apparently, if Corbyn expects to meet with the demands of these self-appointed ‘Jewish leaders’ he must appoint a watchdog who will take care of the so called ‘antisemites’ in his party and, of course, under the supervision of these two ardent Zionist bodies. He must also meet a strict time-frame defined by Judea.
“Outstanding and future cases (of alleged antisemitism) are to be brought to a swift conclusion under a fixed timescale. An independent, mutually agreed upon ombudsman should be appointed to oversee performance, reporting to the Party, as well as to the Board of Deputies and the Jewish Leadership Council.”
Consistent with the spirit of Talmudic herem (excommunication) and totally in contradiction to notions of British openness and Western tolerance, these Jewish institutions insist that “MPs, councillors, and other party members should not share platforms with people who have been suspended or expelled for antisemitism and CLPs should not provide them with a platform.” The Jewish institutions also suggest how to penalise the sinners. “Anybody doing so should, themselves, be suspended from membership; in the case of MPs, they should lose the party whip.” Maybe someone should make the effort to explain to the Jewish leaders that the labour party is an established political institution. It is not a ghetto, I mean, not as yet.
The Jewish bodies insist on dominating the language as well as boundaries of political discussion. Criticism of Israel should be completely restricted. The words ‘Zio’ and ‘Zionist’ as terms of abuse should be eradicated. I actually believe that if the BOD/JLC truly wanted ‘Zionist’ to not be used as a ‘term of abuse,’ they should simply stop abusing Corbyn in the name of Zion as their first step forward.
The British Jewish ‘leaders’ clearly know how to distinguish between the ‘good Jews’ and the bad ones. Corbyn is told to “engage with the Jewish community via its main representative groups, and not through fringe organisations who wish to obstruct the Party’s efforts to tackle antisemitism.” And I wonder, how exactly the BOD or the JLC are ‘representatives’ of British Jews. When were they elected and by whom? And if these two organisations are ‘representative of British Jews,’ how is it that they so selectively call upon Labour to ignore the voice of Jewish collectives they don’t agree with?
The Jewish institutions talk at Corbyn as if he is a schoolboy. “These changes must be sustained and enduring.” Corbyn better quickly meet the Zionist demands before a meeting with The Lobby can materialise. “We firmly believe that this must happen urgently, and certainly before we meet.”
The BOD and the JLC express hope in starting a process of “constructive anti-racist” work within the Labour Party. Talking about racism, we better hear from both the BOD and the JLC how many Muslims and Blacks are members of their executive boards. I ask because, unlike those ‘Jews only’ institutions, the Labour party is, actually, a multi-ethnic and multi-racial political body. If Jewish institutions want to counter racism, they are more than welcome to do so. The racist ‘Jewish State’ is where they should start.
Facebook fails to remove Corbyn death threat as it ‘doesn’t go against standards’
RT | March 29, 2018
Facebook has refused to take down a post calling for Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn to be assassinated. The threat was posted on a Tory-supporting Facebook page, Evolve Politics reports.
The post from the page ‘Conservative memes for Tory Teens’ reads: “I think we should order hits on Russia’s spies,” before going on to say “let’s start with Jeremy Corbyn.”
Evolve Politics signaled the post to Facebook, which got back to them with a generic message saying the post does not contravene its ‘Community Standards.’
The post had already been reported to the police and the social media giant, but was not removed. When one user commented that the post had been reported to authorities, one administrator dismissively said: “It was just a joke, chill.”
He then added: “Why do you hate freedom of speech?” – to which the original commentator said: “Free speech is great as long as it is not advocating violence. When it does advocate violence it breaks the law. Anyway must be nearly your bedtime. Nite nite.”
One of the administrators then told the news outlet that he had mental health issues, and that the page had helped him through. He added he would be taking the page down due to “threats” directed at him, his family and fellow Tories.
“Hay yeah I would like to say that this fb page as it lasted really helped with my depression, I have been struggling with it for a while and this page really helped me, I was a big fan of politics and enjoyed taking part, unfortunately due to threats to myself, my family and Torys [sic] in general I am taking down my meme page, idk what I’ll do now, maybe I’ll find happiness maybe I won’t and do something stupid, but that doesn’t matter does it? As long as you got a kick out of it that all that matters, especially from a page run by 1 person posting crappy memes with no where near 1000 followers but I’m glad u think it’s a big deal.“
Facebook is still to reply to Evolve Politics request for comment over whether it is an accepted policy to keep posts which carry a menace to politicians.
READ MORE:
Top barrister claims to have ‘unambiguous’ confirmation that BBC codes negative Corbyn messages
Why did UK court say “limited evidence” Skripals have relatives while cousin interviewed in UK media?
Why did the UK Home Office make no attempt to contact the Skripals’ relatives in Russia? Why does High Court judgment imply they may not even exist when they have appeared on UK TV? More bizarreness in this already very bizarre case
By Catte | OffGuardian | March 28, 2018
Viktoria Skripal, Sergey’s niece, interviewed by the BBC March 28 2018
The Skripal case has been a strange one, even by current standards. The persistent lack of basic information that extends way beyond anything that could seem to be justified by security considerations. The conflicting accounts, the unprecedented government and media hysteria, the complete rejection of due process, and the demands for international reprisals against a sovereign country based on absurdly scant and inadequate evidence continue to be as baffling as they are dangerous.
We’ve already covered the absence of evidence and the various lies and/or misconceptions or confusions on the part of the UK government, including some of the further puzzles, raised by the High Court judgment made by Mr Justice Williams on March 22, about how much it currently knows about the alleged “nerve agent”
But there are other glaring oddnesses in Williams’ Judgment as well.
One, discussed today by James O’Neill, is the contradiction between Russia’s claims to have tried to make contact with the Skripals through formal channels and having been denied or evaded by the UK, and the UK claim to have received no such requests.
Another, related to the above, is the question of the Skripals’ relatives in Russia. This is what the Judgment says about this:
“… Neither Mr Skripal nor Ms Skripal appear to have relatives in the UK although they appear to have some relatives in Russia. The SSHD have not sought to make contact with them. Discussions have taken place with the OPCW TS about precisely what enquiries they wish to undertake. In summary the main issues are
And
“… Given the absence of any contact having been made with the NHS Trust by any family member, the absence of any evidence of any family in the UK and the limited evidence as to the possible existence of family members in Russia I accept that it is neither practicable nor appropriate in the special context of this case to consult with any relatives of Mr Skripal or Ms Skripal who might fall into the category identified in s.4(7)(b) of the Act.
Firstly, these statements seem to contradict each other and themselves. Do the Skripals “appear” to have relatives in Russia, or is evidence for this so “limited” it can be safely ignored? How can such a basic question be subject to such misty uncertainty?
But odder than that is the fact these allegedly theoretical and possibly non-existent or distant relatives consist of at least one niece/cousin and a mother/grandmother. Second and first degree relatives respectively.
And one of them has been interviewed by at least two different UK news outlets.
Viktoria Skripal, allegedly niece of Sergey and cousin to Yulia was interviewed by the Sun on March 14, one week before the court judgment, and again by the BBC today.
These interviews suggest this particular relative is pretty real, and not very hard to locate. If the Sun could find her on March 14, it’s hard to see how she could still be a mere thought experiment and “limited” theory for the Home Office eight days later.
So, since the implication in the judgment that these (very close) relatives are quasi hypothetical is obviously untrue, why has the Home Secretary (SSHD) not “sought to make contact with” the Skripals’ mother/grandmother and niece/cousin?
Is it because they don’t “fall into the category identified in s.4(7)(b) of the Act”
No. The “Act” being referred to is the 2005 Mental Capacity Act. S.4(7)(b) stipulates that before determining what is in an incapacitated person’s “best interests”, the person ruling (in this case Mr Justice Williams) must:
take into account, if it is practicable and appropriate to consult them, the views of anyone engaged in caring for the person or interested in his welfare
Had Mr Justice Williams not been informed that one of these relatives was so “practicable” to consult she’d recently been featured in the Murdoch press? Surely, if he knew how easy to locate they were, his judgment would have reflected the assumption a mother/grandmother, niece/cousin would at very least be “interested” in the “welfare” of Yulia and Sergey?
Do such close and easily contactable relatives really warrant being passed over simply because of “the absence of any contact having been made with the NHS Trust by any member of the family”?
I mean look, these people are in Russia. It’s possible – shocking – they don’t speak English. It’s possible they aren’t clear how to get in contact directly with a rural hospital in Wiltshire. It’s possible they tried but failed.
Would it hurt someone at the Home Office to get on the phone and check things out before assuming they just don’t care and taking the matter to court?
What’s more, far from being indifferent, Viktoria tells her interviewer she is worried about her uncle and cousin and is anxious to get information:
“I would just like to know how [Yulia and Sergey] are. Where they are.“
“If you were offered the chance to go the the UK would you go?”
“Yes, yes”
If this is the case, can we take it as pretty unlikely the Skripals have really made no attempt to contact the UK about their family members?
And, if you look at the wording again:
Given the absence of any contact having been made with the NHS Trust by any family member
It doesn’t actually say no contact has been made does it? It says no contact has been made with the NHS trust. This leaves the undeclared possibility there has been contact made by the Skripals with other departments of the UK state. This would broadly dovetail with claims made by the Russian foreign ministry, which, until at least March 19, has maintained its attempts to gain access to or information about the Skripals have been stonewalled.
If the Skripals have tried to gain information, either directly or through their embassy or consulate, why aren’t they being given any? Why aren’t they being consulted about the medical interventions being performed? Why has Viktoria been told so little since the poisoning, that she tells the BBC she still holds out a fanciful hope the victims may not even be Julia and Sergey?
Altogether, it seems this part of the official narrative is as confused and as hard to reconcile with reality as the clearly unwarranted claims about “novichoks.”
NOTE: The Guardian’s version of the BBC interview with Viktoria is shockingly deceptive. It omits all mention of the main point of the interview – that Viktoria is desperate for information and has received none – and contrives through this omission, and its headline (“Sergey and Yulia Skripal have slim chance of survival says niece”) to give the absolutely opposite impression – that Viktoria has been well informed, may even have seen her relatives and is predicting their small chance of survival from first hand observation. Even in the Guardian’s recent history of poor ethical choices and lies by omission, this is egregious in the extreme.
UK to launch anti-Russian propaganda war as ‘Fusion Doctrine’ defense plan unveiled
RT | March 28, 2018
Britain is preparing for a counter-propaganda war against Russia amid allegations that the Kremlin is spreading fake news regarding the poisoning of Sergei Skripal.
Intelligence services will now be tasked with identifying trolling social media platforms in a bid to clamp down on what is deemed by the UK government as ‘misinformation.’ The new instructions are included in the Fusion Doctrine, unveiled as part of the National Security Capability Review, to be published on Wednesday. It seeks to tackle the perceived threat from Islamic State (IS, formerly ISIS), Russia and North Korea.
Increased efforts to tackle fake news come amid security experts alleging, in the Telegraph, that Russia put out more than 20 stories “trying to confuse the picture and the charge sheet” over the poisoning of ex-double agent Sergei Skripal and his daughter, Yulia, in Salisbury earlier this month.
It follows reports of Britain sharing “unprecedented levels of intelligence” with countries in a bid to persuade them of Russia’s involvement in the Skripal attack. The material provided includes evidence from the chemical weapons facility at Porton Down, just outside the Wiltshire town. The information was cited as being key to 23 states and NATO expelling dozens of Russian diplomats. The UK usually only shares highly classified documents with fellow ‘Five Eyes’ countries, namely the US, Australia, New Zealand and Canada.
Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn received widespread criticism after failing to squarely point the finger at Russia over the Skripal case in the aftermath of the poisoning. He requested that more evidence be made available and that the channels of international law be utilized before people make allegations against the Kremlin.
While expelling three diplomats from the Czech Republic, President Milos Zeman echoed such calls, saying: “I want to see the facts. I will certainly welcome if the United Kingdom presents some evidence that the Russians wanted to kill the double agent Skripal,” Blesk news outlet reported on Tuesday. Zeman has also ordered the Czech counter-intelligence services to investigate whether the A-234 nerve agent, also known as Novichok, could have been produced in his country.
Russia has vehemently denied any wrongdoing and has hit out at the UK’s refusal to allow it to assess the agent. It has also criticized Britain for failing to disclose information relating to the case.
Russian Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova responded to the diplomatic expulsions, saying: “An adequate response will be given to all steps of the United States and the European Union, which we see. This refers to the expulsion of Russian diplomats and the closure of the consulate-general [in Seattle].”
“We demand that the UK provide all available information on this case,” Zakharova added. “To date, Russia has received zero information on what happened. Perhaps this data is not being made public because it includes nothing but political slogans.”
Some Further Thoughts on the Skripal Affair
By James O’Neill | OffGuardian | March 28, 2018
Let the jury consider the verdict” the King said. “No, No” said the Queen: “sentence first, verdict afterwards”. “Stuff and nonsense” said Alice.
The furore surrounding the alleged nerve gas poisoning of Sergei Skripal and his daughter Yulia shows no signs of abating. It continuously puts one in mind of the quote from Lewis Carroll’s Alice in Wonderland at the head of this article.
For those of us with fond of memories of some of the traditional virtues of common-law justice, such as the presumption of innocence, the onus of proof upon the accuser, a verdict based upon evidence beyond reasonable doubt, and a prohibition on prejudicial pre-trial comment, it all seems like a very distant past.
The latest development has been a group of nations, largely in the European Union, but also including United States, Canada, Australia and European minnows like Albania and Macedonia, joining the collective hysteria and expelling, at the time of writing, more than 100 Russian diplomats.
That action will achieve nothing, other than to the poison the cold war atmosphere eagerly promoted by the intellectual lightweights so prominent in the governments from United Kingdom to the United States to Australia. The few sane voices in this cacophony of nonsense, such as those of the governments of Portugal, Greece and Austria, or Die Linke’s Andreas Maurer in Germany who noted in various ways that not jumping to conclusions and actually waiting for the results of the now extant OPCW’s Technical Committee investigation, might be preferable to rushing headlong to a possible nuclear confrontation with Russia, are scarcely heard.
British Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn made similar remarks, only to be savagely attacked by members of his own party, as well as Tory leaders such as May, Johnson and Williamson.
The careful and cautiously worded judgement of Mr Justice Williams released on 22 March 2018 has been largely ignored by the politicians and the mainstream media alike.
Justice Williams was delivering the judgement on an application by the Secretary of State for the Home Department for permission to be given for the taking of blood samples from the Skripals for analysis by the OPCW experts in accordance with the terms of the Convention on the Prevention of Chemical Weapons.
The Skripals were admitted to Salisbury Hospital on 4 March 2018 and it took until 14 March for the British government to invite the OPCW to assist in the technical evaluation of what had caused the Skripal’s illness.
The Judge did not comment on why it took 10 days for this invitation to issue, particularly as the Russian government had correctly pointed out that it should have been done much earlier in accordance with the article 9 of the Convention.
Indeed, May had issued peremptory demands for Russia to, in effect, prove its innocence within 36 hours. The application by the Home Department was necessary as the Skripals, because of their stated medical condition (in a coma, but stable) were unable to give an informed consent. The Judge presumed, probably correctly, if they were able to give consent they would do so. They have a greater interest than anyone else in determining who was responsible and holding them (or their government) to account.
The Russian government, which clearly was an interested party as among other reasons Ms Skripal was a Russian citizen, was not a party to the proceedings, nor, it seems, were they even advised that the application was being made. The Russian government have certainly stated that, and the British government has made no denial.
The absence of the Russians from the application would ordinarily have invited a query from the Judge. He may well have done so, but as the proceedings were held in camera, we cannot establish that. His Honour appears to have accepted a submission from Mr Sachdeva QC, acting for the Skripals, that the Russian authorities had made no attempt to seek access to the Skripals or their medical records.
This is prima facie highly improbable, particularly given the case’s high profile. The Russian government to the contrary has claimed that all their requests for access, medical details and related evidence were ignored or refused by the British government.
It is not possible to definitively resolve that conflict, but the weight of logic, common sense and the evidence we do have would tend to support the Russian position.
There is no reason at this point to question the integrity of the OCPW technical evaluation. It seems likely however, that they may well not be able to ascertain precisely what substance was used to affect the Skripals. Almost certainly, neither will they be able to specify its precise origins, much less who administered it. More than three weeks after the attack we still have no clear idea as to how the poison, if that is indeed what it is, was administered.
That qualified conclusion, which is surely known to the British government, may be a major reason why such a huge propaganda effort is currently being made before the likely inconclusive results are published. It may also account for the meaningless terminology used in statements by the UK government and others that the poison was “of a type developed by Russia.”
That statement in itself is inaccurate. It has zero evidential value, but is clearly seen as having a powerful propaganda effect. Most casual readers of the mainstream media or viewers of the BBC and their foreign equivalents will be unaware of any of the history of nerve agents, or their possession and use by multiple countries, not least the United Kingdom itself.
Perhaps the most depressing conclusion to be drawn from this saga is the one expressed by the commentator known as the Saker (What Happened to the West I was born in? 26 March 2018). He argues that during the previous Cold War, although the West was hardly a knight in shining armour, the rule of law did matter, as did some degree of critical thinking. Now, the West is ruled by an “ugly gang of ignorant, arrogant psychopaths”.
Their hubris will lead to making fatal miscalculations about the degree of Russian resolve, and the ability of Russia, (as was demonstrated so effectively by Putin in his address to the joint sitting of the Russian Parliament on 1 March 2018), that rather than “shutting up and going away”, as Williamson hoped, the simple fact is that Britain will be a heap of radioactive ashes long before Russia “goes away”.
It is significant that China’s Global Times, an official voice for the thinking of the Chinese government, sees the current attack on Russia as a prelude to a similar assault upon China as the crumbling Anglo-American Empire tries to maintain its hegemony. China has not joined the Western chorus of condemnation of Russia. Instead it sees what it describes as the “Russia China comprehensive strategic collaborative partnership” as the best safeguard against Western attack. It is for this reason that the Saker is probably too pessimistic. For the sake of our grandchildren one hopes that he was indeed wrong.
West Wants Total Partition and Defeat of Russia – Analyst
© Sputnik/ Vitaliy Belousov
Sputnik – March 27, 2018
On Monday, a number of European countries, as well as the United States and Canada, announced they were expelling Russian diplomats over the Skripal case. Radio Sputnik discussed the significance of the diplomatic response by the Western powers with Srdja Trifkovic, a US journalist and writer on international affairs.
Sputnik: What is your overall assessment about what has happened with this diplomatic response by so many countries? How significant is it?
Srdja Trifkovic: The overall impression is that rational discourse has given way to collective hysteria and that it is indeed remarkable. The extent to which the bandwagon has successfully started rolling while we don’t even have elementary answers to the questions concerning the case itself.
The second important and discouraging aspect is that continental European countries have followed the Anglo-American lead in Russophobia and this represents a further trial of the Atlanticist domination over Europe. It is indeed remarkable when both Germany and France, the putative leaders of independent European foreign policy, have been reduced to the status of automatic followers of the lead supported by Washington especially when we bear in mind that the initial round of sanctions in 2014 against Russia was dictated by the United States which had nothing to lose in the proceedings and to the detriments of Europeans’ interests.
So overall I think that, one we have the hysterical phase of Russophobic discourse in the West which is not amenable to any rational arguments and two, we have a successful degradation of European diplomacy to the status of pliant satellites comparable to East Germany and Bulgaria vis-à-vis Brezhnev.
Sputnik: Do you think there was some classified evidence that was presented that proves beyond a shadow of doubt that Russia was involved or do you think that the fact that there are 11 countries who have not joined in the protest perhaps hints at the fact that this was not the case?
Srdja Trifkovic: Well, first of all, I would say that President Putin, Foreign Minister Lavrov and others would not have made such categorical denials of Russian involvement if there was any possibility of a smoking gun which could effectively show to the world that they were not telling the truth.
And secondly, it is always possible to present some equivocal evidence in the form that even if that indicates the modus operandi of intelligence agencies nevertheless does not disclose outright state secrets. In fact, we’ve seen that in the past and I don’t think that it would be possible for such confidential information to be disclosed to the diplomats and foreign ministers of EU countries as divergent as the 27 are, without risking these very sources.
So I really believe that if you look at the countries which have taken measures against Russia, they almost read like who is who of those who are prepared to follow the US lead and if you look at those reluctant to do so, including Austria, Hungary, Cyprus, Greece, we are looking at those who actually have a more independent foreign policy. So I don’t think it’s a reflection of the quality of possible intelligence, it is simply a reflection of the determination of decision-makers of those countries to preserve a modicum of independence.
Sputnik: What would you say about the level to which the actions that were actually taken by individual countries? What can you say about the numbers game that’s being played? What do you think determined the number of diplomats?
Srdja Trifkovic: Some of these countries are absolutely insignificant countries like the Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia, which also expelled one Russian and it’s just a pathetic non country. On the other hand in the United States obviously it is a matter of regret that President Trump’s initially stated intention to have detente with Russia has been subverted by the deep state, it is a long story but now we have really reached the end of the road with the appointment of Pompeo to State Department and Bolton as the national security adviser.
So we can really look at Trump as the would-be drainer of the swamp who has been swallowed by the swamp. And I think that we are in for a long haul. I was in Moscow two weeks ago and coming again next week and sometimes I am surprised that some of my Russian interlocutors are insufficiently aware of the animosity or end of the rule Russophobic sentiment that currently prevails among the Western elites, both political and academic and media. It’s almost pathetic when some Russians still use the term “our Western partners,” because for partnership you need to have a modicum of mutual respect and trust and these people really seriously want to destroy Russia.
They want to delegitimize the Russian political system and process as we have seen with the public commentary on President Putin’s re-election and they want nothing short of regime change, which would then lead to a permanent and irreversible change of Russia’s national character and possibly the country’s partition along the lines allocated by Zbigniew Brzezinski. With these people partnership is impossible and Russia needs to be prepared for a long and sustained period of confrontation.
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New Book
The Garlic Book — 2026
Lies are Unbekoming | November 5, 2026
What The Garlic Book shows
The book is in four parts.
Part One, The Record, treats the history of garlic as evidence. From the clay garlic bulb placed in an Egyptian grave nearly six thousand years ago, through the Ebers Papyrus, through Hippocrates, Dioscorides, Pliny and Galen, the Arab physicians under Avicenna, the medieval herbals, Culpeper, and the plague years, to the last era in which Western physicians prescribed garlic as a matter of course, which ran from 1850 to 1945. It closes with the living traditions that never stopped using it, and with the folklore of charms, vampires and the evil eye.
Part Two, The Chemistry and the Evidence, sets out what is known about why a clove has no smell until it is cut, and why the order of crush, rest and heat changes the medicine. It then reads the clinical evidence against the historical record — bacteria, blood and vessels, cancer epidemiology, metals and fatigue — and names the trials that went against garlic as directly as the trials that went for it, including the 2007 Stanford trial funded by the US National Institutes of Health which found that raw garlic, garlic powder and aged garlic extract moved LDL cholesterol no more than placebo did. It then turns to onion, garlic’s closest relative, and reads the newer evidence published since 2015, before closing with the whole of the record through the terrain lens.
Part Three, Why Medicine Set It Aside, asks the question directly. One chapter contrasts the pharmaceutical model of isolating a single active compound with the folk model of combining whole plants, and reports what the garlic evidence says about which model works better. One chapter examines the economics of research on a plant that cannot be patented. One chapter — Fire Cider — tells the story of a folk preparation whose name was taken into a United States trademark by a Massachusetts company in 2012, and won back by three herbalists in 2014 who documented forty years of prior use through Rosemary Gladstar and her students into the older tradition.
Part Four, Garlic in Practice, is the working manual — the kitchen pharmacy, traditional uses by body system, a full chapter on safety and interactions, and a complaint-by-complaint practical guide. The book closes with The Trial That Was Never Run — a one-chapter reading of the whole evidential architecture.
At the back: two appendices (a traditional list of uses, and a preparation quick-reference), a full bibliography, and a live index.
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