UK counter-terror dept probes new deadly nerve agent poisoning

July 05, 2018 20:24

Britain's counter-terrorism officers are today investigating how a couple from a quiet English town fell critically ill from the same military-grade deadly nerve agent that nearly killed former Russian double agent Sergei Skripal and his daughter Yulia in March.

Dawn Sturgess, 44, and Charlie Rowley, 45, were found critically ill on Saturday in the village of Amesbury, close to the city of Salisbury, where former double agent Skripal and his daughter were found slumped on a bench on March 4 in an incident that sparked a diplomatic crisis with Russia.

Scotland Yard's Neil Basu, the senior-most counter-terrorism officer, confirmed that expert scientists in chemical warfare at the UK's Porton Down laboratory had established that nerve agent Novichok had caused their collapse.

"Following the detailed analysis of these samples, we can confirm that the man and woman have been exposed to the nerve agent Novichok, which has been identified as the same nerve agent that contaminated both Yulia and Skripal," said Metropolitan Police Assistant Commissioner Basu.

"The priority for the investigation team now, is to establish how these two people have come into contact with this nerve agent," he said.

Basu clarified that there was nothing in the backgrounds of Sturgess or Rowley, both British nationals, that would suggest they would be a target for a deliberate attack - they have no connections to the intelligence or security communities.

Around 100 detectives from the UK's Counter Terrorism Policing Network are now working on the investigation, alongside officers from Wiltshire Police. They have cordoned off a number of sites as a "precautionary measure" in the Amesbury and Salisbury areas that they believe the duo visited in the period before they fell ill.

British Prime Minister Theresa May said it was "deeply disturbing" to see two more people exposed to the deadly Soviet era Novichok nerve agent in the UK, and that British police would leave "no stone unturned in their investigation".

-- PTI

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