Vladimir Putin is “overwhelmingly likely” to have ordered the nerve agent attack on Sergei Skripal according to Boris Johnson.
The foreign secretary said “our quarrel is with Putin’s Kremlin, and with his decision” over the nerve agent attack.
Russia denies ordering the attack and has said that the accusations against Putin are “shocking and unforgivable”. Russian ex-spy Sergei Skripal, 66, and his daughter Yulia Skripal, 33, remain critically ill in hospital.
Speaking alongside the Polish foreign minister, Mr Johnson said the UK’s “quarrel is with Putin’s Kremlin”.
“We think it overwhelmingly likely that it was his decision to direct the use of a nerve agent on the streets of the UK, on the streets of Europe, for the first time since the Second World War,” he said.
Presidential press-secretary Dmitry Peskov told the state-run Tass news agency: “We have already said on many levels that Russia has nothing to do with this story whatsoever.
“Any reference or mention of our president in this connection is nothing but a shocking and unforgivable violation of the diplomatic rules of propriety.”
Tories dust off patriotism play book to fend off election wipe out
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