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Novichok In Salisbury: Secret Agents & Nerve Agents In Britain

Eponastill said:
According to this, Novichock-like poisons were developed as 'binary agents' where two simple and innocuous precursors get mixed together to create something nasty. So doesn't that imply that it doesn't have to have been smuggled through customs in a perfume bottle. That it could have been made in a lab (or garage) in this country? Using ingredients that could be found here. (By anyone in the know I guess).
https://cen.acs.org/articles/96/i12/Nerve-agent-attack-on-spy-used-Novichok-poison.html
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It might but not necessarily. "Combining" these precursors does not necessarily mean just pouring a bit of A and a bit of B into a test tube and shaking it. In fact I would be very surprised if it did. If you already have a lab in Russia that can manufacture it, it is likely to be easier to have it made there.
 
Cavynaut said:
Not exclusively we don't.

That razor you like so much could equally point to a Russian criminal gang hit for example.
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Yeah, a Russian criminal gang: The Kremlin! Amirite?!
 
blessmycottonsocks said:
It does seem odd that a few forumists are so keen to play up the woo factor, rather than stick with the known facts and keep Ockham 's razor close at hand.

Putin vows that traitors will "choke and die" .

Sergei Skripal was a very effective double-agent, who exposed some 300 Russian spies.

Skripal was released from incarceration in Russia as part of a spy swap.

Skripal was described as "still in the game" after moving to the UK and met with intelligence services both in the UK and in former Soviet bloc countries.

Skripal's wife, son and brother die in unclear circumstances.

Skripal and his daughter's email and mobiles are hacked by Russia.

Skripal and his daughter choke and almost die due to being poisoned by Russian nerve agent.

... and yet the tinfoil hat brigade still point the finger at Porton Down!
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Well, I'm not intentionally looking for a conspiracy and I'm not a member of the tin-foil hat brigade. I'm just seeing this farce play out and recognising that very little of it (if any) makes sense.

For instance, I find it a bit suss that the Skripals, (you know, the intended targets) didn't receive enough of a dose to kill either of them, yet - weeks, nay months, later - a random couple come across the remainder of the poison and one of them receives enough of a dose to sadly be killed.

I find myself asking:
- where was this mysterious bottle all these weeks?
- why has it only surfaced now?
- could this latest 'Russian attack' have anything to do with the fact that Russia was starting to look nothing like a threat, thanks to the World Cup?

If that makes me a tin-foil hat wearer, then fine. But if I must wear such apparel it shan't be a mere hat. It will most certainly be a beret.

:)
 
I would want 2 biohazard suits 14 pairs of underpants and my willy in a jar of dettel before
going within 40 paces of the stuff so anyone that would go and spray a door handle with it
without looking like the urban spaceman is a braver man than me, would not be supprised
if it cam in the post and a posti uniform would be a good disguise for anyone buggering about
with a strangers door, do they do biohazard suits that look like posti uniforms or any other
currier type person.
 
How much are the tickets for the gig?
 
RaM said:
I would want 2 biohazard suits 14 pairs of underpants and my willy in a jar of dettel before
going within 40 paces of the stuff so anyone that would go and spray a door handle with it
without looking like the urban spaceman is a braver man than me, would not be supprised
if it cam in the post and a posti uniform would be a good disguise for anyone buggering about
with a strangers door, do they do biohazard suits that look like posti uniforms or any other
currier type person.
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Maybe, buy there are people is Russia who will set themselves on fire and then jump off the top of their giant apartment building into a snow pile, for the lulz and to post on youtube.
 
kamalktk said:
Maybe, buy there are people is Russia who will set themselves on fire and then jump off the top of their giant apartment building into a snow pile, for the lulz and to post on youtube.
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Don't forget weeing outside aswell.
 
GNC said:
Yeah, a Russian criminal gang: The Kremlin! Amirite?!
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Russia is run by criminals. No need to be surprised if they have gotten another criminal gang to do the assassination attempt to avoid too much attention against the Russian government and the FSB.
 
I had to attend a funeral, at the do after a small swathi guy with a minder about the size of a mountain
"think sasquatch in a suit" who never spoke a word, came up and asked what branch of the organisation I belonged to, think I was the only one there that was not Russian mafia, he later donated £2000 to a charity that had helped the deceased in the last days of his life, dont suppose they ever knew were it came from.
 
Mr_Nemo said:
Don't forget weeing outside aswell.
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At the vodka-fuelled winter barbecues? When the idea is to walk backwards while peeing to outpace the stalactite of frozen piss that rises from the snow towards their penis?
 
Vardoger said:
Russia is run by criminals. No need to be surprised if they have gotten another criminal gang to do the assassination attempt to avoid too much attention against the Russian government and the FSB.
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Yes, that might explain the sloppy assassination and non-disposal of the vial.
 
Vardoger said:
Russia is run by criminals. No need to be surprised if they have gotten another criminal gang to do the assassination attempt to avoid too much attention against the Russian government and the FSB.
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You don't need to use a middle man when getting your own agents to do it causes exactly the right amount of mistrust and confusion.
 
I'm running out of foil (for my hats, ysee).
This morning's story - Charlie Rowley released from hospital. And surely that means he goes home for a nice rest. Because he was accidentally caught up in this wasn't he? He got really ill, he was nursed back to health, and now he can try to get back to his life.

But then I read
"Rowley’s brother, Matthew, said on Friday: “I don’t know if they will release where he is. I don’t think he is 100%. I don’t know how it works after he’s released, I’m going to wait for the police to tell me. It is a big thing. It’s been awful. I just hope he’s comfortable, wherever he is.”"

what? Ok the police would want to speak to him in detail about what he did and where he picked up the perfume "or aftershave" bottle (it's an aftershave bottle now, soon it will be a Brasso can, mark my words). But he's not on anyone's hit list. Why would his brother imply he's being held somewhere secret? It's a little bit bizarre, surely. Yes maybe it's good if he doesn't get swooped on by all the press and so on desperate to hear his story. And maybe he needs ongoing medical support, psychological support and everything. But his brother makes it sound as though even he doesn't know where his brother is. Like he's been spirited away like the Skripals. Which seems a bit ott.

https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news...olice-search-salisbury-park-visited-by-couple

go on, someone explain the folly of my thinking (you know, compare it with what happened last time a civilian accidentally got poisoned by some nerve agent left lying in a park).

oh and another thing: "Rowley’s brother has claimed the vessel was a perfume or aftershave bottle and said the couple found it in a park around nine days before they fell ill. Matthew Rowley claimed his brother had told him one or both of them sprayed the perfume over themselves – and also said the vessel broke. The authorities have not confirmed his version of events."

ohhh so now they found it nine days before they sprayed it on themselves. Obviously. I always leave my new scavenged bottle of perfume (or aftershave) hanging about nine days before it occurs to me to find out what it smells like. Nine days indeed. And then the bottle broke apparently.
And now what are we supposed to do with the information that they were in the park the day before they got ill? Even though that's not when they picked up the bottle. Perhaps they went to the park all the time of course. Like nine days previously. Or did they not pick the bottle up in the park at all but somewhere else? That's going to require rewriting the story yet again.

soo convoluted.
 
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Eponastill said:
go on, someone explain the folly of my thinking (you know, compare it with what happened last time a civilian accidentally got poisoned by some nerve agent left lying in a park).
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When was that?
 
Eponastill said:
I'm running out of foil (for my hats, ysee).
This morning's story - Charlie Rowley released from hospital. And surely that means he goes home for a nice rest. Because he was accidentally caught up in this wasn't he? He got really ill, he was nursed back to health, and now he can try to get back to his life.

But then I read
"Rowley’s brother, Matthew, said on Friday: “I don’t know if they will release where he is. I don’t think he is 100%. I don’t know how it works after he’s released, I’m going to wait for the police to tell me. It is a big thing. It’s been awful. I just hope he’s comfortable, wherever he is.”"

what? Ok the police would want to speak to him in detail about what he did and where he picked up the perfume "or aftershave" bottle (it's an aftershave bottle now, soon it will be a Brasso can, mark my words). But he's not on anyone's hit list. Why would his brother imply he's being held somewhere secret? It's a little bit bizarre, surely. Yes maybe it's good if he doesn't get swooped on by all the press and so on desperate to hear his story. And maybe he needs ongoing medical support, psychological support and everything. But his brother makes it sound as though even he doesn't know where his brother is. Like he's been spirited away like the Skripals. Which seems a bit ott.

https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news...olice-search-salisbury-park-visited-by-couple

go on, someone explain the folly of my thinking (you know, compare it with what happened last time a civilian accidentally got poisoned by some nerve agent left lying in a park).

oh and another thing: "Rowley’s brother has claimed the vessel was a perfume or aftershave bottle and said the couple found it in a park around nine days before they fell ill. Matthew Rowley claimed his brother had told him one or both of them sprayed the perfume over themselves – and also said the vessel broke. The authorities have not confirmed his version of events."

ohhh so now they found it nine days before they sprayed it on themselves. Obviously. I always leave my new scavenged bottle of perfume (or aftershave) hanging about nine days before it occurs to me to find out what it smells like. Nine days indeed. And then the bottle broke apparently.
And now what are we supposed to do with the information that they were in the park the day before they got ill? Even though that's not when they picked up the bottle. Perhaps they went to the park all the time of course. Like nine days previously. Or did they not pick the bottle up in the park at all but somewhere else? That's going to require rewriting the story yet again.

soo convoluted.
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This story is playing out like a drama series where a different person writes each episode. No continuity, and the viewers are left increasingly confused.
 
An update.
The Novichok bottle was disguised and in a box that looked like perfume packaging.

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-44947162

Still no detail about where Charlie Rowley found it. It's still a bit vague.

I suspect he'd done a bit of dumpster diving and found this box intact. Otherwise, it would have ended up in landfill.
 
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Mythopoeika said:
An update.
The Novichok bottle was disguised and in a box that looked like perfume packaging.

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-44947162

Still no detail about where Charlie Rowley found it. It's still a bit vague.

I suspect he'd done a bit of dumpster diving and found this box intact. Otherwise, it would have ended up in landfill.
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Hmm.
Charlie Rowley, who was also poisoned, said he gave his partner Dawn Sturgess the box - which he believed to be perfume - as a present.
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I think I would be slightly less than impressed if Mr Zebra gave me some perfume he'd found lying about in a park, or in a bin, or wherever, as a present. But that's just me of course.

On a serious note it is tragic of course that he is now having to deal with the death of his loved one and guilt as well., and that's awful really because no matter what his world view is on suitable presents, he does not deserve to go through this.


But I still don't quite get something. Well, anything, actually.

So the poison was disguised in a perfume bottle, inside appropriate packaging. Fair enough, good way to smuggle poison about I suppose; but are we really supposed to believe that the 'perps', after poisoning the Skripals, carefullly re-packaged their perfume bottle back into it's box and then discarded the entire thing?

Why not just chuck the separate pieces in a bin?

And no one still seems able to tell us how this mysterious perfume bottle / presentation box came to be on the loose around the Salisbury area for all this time, and then was only picked up by someone now.

:bored:
 
Assuming I were a good hearted salt-of-the-earth type recovering drug addict and I found a discarded box apparently containing expensive perfume in the park or in a bin or wherever and I planned to give it to my girlfriend as a present, surely I’d give it a sniff myself first if only to check it wasn’t piss or water...? There are certainly some fairly puzzling aspects to this narrative!
 
Carse said:
Assuming I were a good hearted salt-of-the-earth type recovering drug addict and I found a discarded box apparently containing expensive perfume in the park or in a bin or wherever and I planned to give it to my girlfriend as a present, surely I’d give it a sniff myself first if only to check it wasn’t piss or water...? There are certainly some fairly puzzling aspects to this narrative!
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Quite. And would one not sniff to also make sure it was the sort of aroma that one's girlfriend would actually like?
 
"The 45-year-old believes he had the glass bottle at his home for a couple of days before giving it to his partner."​
Last time we heard it was nine days, nine days is quite hard to confuse with a couple of days? Nine days is also quite specific and an odd thing to say if you don't have a reason to say it.

"He described the bottle as having a plastic dispenser which was held in a cardboard box with a plastic moulding.
He said it looked expensive and that Ms Sturgess recognised the brand on the box.
In an interview with ITV News, he said: "I do have a memory of her spraying it on her wrists and rubbing them together.
"I guess that's how she applied it and became ill. I guess how I got in contact with it is when I put the spray part to the bottle... I ended tipping some on my hands, but I washed it off under the tap."​
"When I put the spray part to the bottle"?? What sort of perfume comes with a separate part you add to the bottle to spray it? WD40? That's a bit bizarre and as SZ says, what sort of assassin "carefullly re-packaged their perfume bottle back into it's box and then discarded the entire thing?" including unattaching the spray which was by now covered in poison.

"It had an oily substance and I smelled it and it didn't smell of perfume. It felt oily. I washed it off and I didn't think anything of it. It all happened so quick."​
It didn't smell of perfume but he gave it to her anyway. Wouldn't you even have a sniff to see if it was something nice? If it was a present? And he washed it off, but although it didn't smell of perfume, she didn't wash it off? Or she did wash it off and they "didn't think anything of it" although 15 minutes later she needed an ambulance and this was not mentioned to the paramedics. Because if it had been he wouldn't have been allowed back to the house to fetch her clothes, only getting ill 4 hours later.

I feel mean because someone died but it's still all a bit fishy isn't it. Particularly the careful / not careful disposal of the bottle.

And the oiliness. I thought it was supposed to be water soluble.

I'm back to my foil tent now.
 
What reason would he have had to suspect the perfume in the first place? He might simply have thought it was food poisoning or similar.
 
Xanatic* said:
What reason would he have had to suspect the perfume in the first place? He might simply have thought it was food poisoning or similar.
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Fair comment, that's true, especially if he was feeling ok. Thank god it's not really dangerous though and takes 15 minutes plus time to get to the hospital to act. Neurotoxins aren't as good as they used to be.

Also can I just point out that the Guardian reports it was in a SEALED box.
https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news...within-15-minutes-says-partner-charlie-rowley


Rowley said he had found a sealed box in a cellophane wrapper containing a perfume bottle some days before he and Sturgess fell ill, and had kept it at his home in Amesbury, eight miles north of Salisbury, before handing it to his partner of two years as a gift.

He said he was struggling to remember where he had originally found the item but was convinced it was legitimate, as it looked like it hadn’t been used, “Which made me think it was quite safe,” he said.
​
Which rather makes it sound like it wasn't the perfume bottle at all. Because it's just crazy that the assassins are putting their novichok in carefully made and cellophane sealed perfume bottles / boxes. This is not making sense. Plus he now can't remember where he found it.

Or you can think it was novichok, but now there are two bottles. One just randomly thrown away although unopened and completely innocent looking.

here's the ITV interview
http://www.itv.com/news/2018-07-24/charlie-rowley-novichok-amesbury/
which says 'his memory's been affected' but 'he's convinced he didn't find the bottle in a park in salisbury'. So that's another thing that doesn't add up.

It's rather a shame he gave her the perfume after he realised it didn't smell of anything. It's awful that she died, and I feel sorry for him, he looks tired of life. But this is all very weird.
 
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