Russia asks questions to OPCW over Skripal case

Russia has referred to the Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW) a list of 13 questions concerning the so-called Skripal case.

The list has such questions as what kind of data and materials were provided by the United Kingdom and whether the organization plans to share the British side’s information with Russia.

The Russian side also wants to know what kind of assistance from the OPCW technical secretariat was asked by London, whether it requests to verify the very fact of the use of a nerve agent or to conform that it was a Novichok-class substance.

Apart from that, Russia asks the OPCW who led its expert team that visited the United Kingdom, how long they worked in the UK and whom they contacted with.

The Russian foreign ministry asks to explain the procedure of sample collecting and whether the OPCW’s basic probe principle, the so-called chain of custody, was observed.

"Which certified laboratories will analyze the samples collected by the OPCW technical secretariat during the visit of its experts to the United Kingdom," the ministry asks.

The Russian side wants to know whether the OPCW technical secretariat gave its consent to the disclosure of the British side’s investigation data to the European Union countries and whether France notified it about its joining the technical assistance requested by the United Kingdom.

"Did France share materials of its own investigation (if any) with the OPCW technical secretariat and can it share the materials of the French investigation (if any) with Russia? If not, then why," the ministry said.

On March 4, former Russian military intelligence officer Sergei Skripal, 66, who had been earlier sentenced in Russia for spying for the UK, and his daughter Yulia, 33, were found unconscious on a bench near the Maltings shopping center in Salisbury, UK. Police said they had been exposed to a nerve agent.