Russian wanted over novichok poisoning 'to break silence'
The UK government accuses Russia of reacting to the identification of the suspects with "obfuscation and lies".
Wednesday 12 September 2018 16:15, UK
A Russian man wanted by the UK over the novichok poisoning of the Skripals says he will comment on the case next week.
Russian state TV channel Rossiya-24 said the suspect named as Alexander Petrov would break his silence next week.
Hours before, Vladimir Putin said Russia has identified the pair accused of poisoning former Russian spy Sergei Skripal and his daughter Yulia with novichok in Salisbury in March.
The Russian president said they are "civilians" with no links to the government.
Rossiya-24 said it had spoken to Mr Petrov but he would not comment now, saying only that he worked for a pharmaceutical company in the Siberian city of Tomsk.
"No comment for the moment. Maybe later. Next week, I think," he said.
The British government recently said Scotland Yard detectives had identified Mr Petrov and Ruslan Boshirov as suspects, and said they were from Russia's foreign military intelligence agency, the GRU.
Reacting to Mr Putin's assertion that the spies were civilians, Theresa May's spokesman said Russia has continually replied to requests for an account of what happened in Salisbury with "obfuscation and lies" and he could see "nothing to suggest that has changed".
He said the government had exposed them as GRU operatives - and that is what they are.
On Wednesday morning, Mr Putin said: "We know who they are, we have found them.
"There is nothing special or criminal about it, I can assure you."
The Russian president denied they worked for the military and described them as "civilians".
"I would like to call on them so that they can hear us today," he told an economic forum in the Russian city of Vladivostok.
"They should go to some media outlet. I hope they will come forward and tell about themselves."
Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said the president has not communicated with the men themselves since they were accused of poisoning the Skripals.
Mrs May said the poisoning was not a "rogue operation" and their actions were "almost certainly also approved outside the GRU at a senior level of the Russian state".
An Interpol "red notice" and a European arrest warrant have been issued for the two suspects' arrest should they try to leave Russia.
Russia never extradites its citizens so the UK government did not bother asking. The Kremlin refused to extradite Andrei Lugovoi, the suspect in the 2006 Alexander Litvinenko poisoning.