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Agence France-Presse

Investigative group Bellingcat has identified the second suspect in the poisoning of former Russian spy Sergei Skripal as a doctor employed by Moscow’s GRU military intelligence service.
The Kremlin has rejected past charges about its involvement in the case as fabrications aimed at discrediting Russia.
Yet analysts will read Bellingcat’s latest publication for more clues into the alleged workings of a Russian spy agency at the centre of several international disputes.
“We have now identified ‘Alexander Petrov’ to be in fact Dr Alexander Yevgenyevich Mishkin, a trained military doctor in the employ of the GRU,” the British-based group said in a report published on its website.
Skripal and his daughter Yulia were poisoned by a Soviet-designed chemical agent called Novichok in the English town of Salisbury in March.

Britain accuses the Russian government of trying to kill Skripal in retribution for his ongoing work with European intelligence agencies.
Russia says Britain has no proof.
The Skripal case and last week’s revelations that the GRU also allegedly tried to hack into the world’s chemical weapons watchdog in the Netherlands have further tattered Moscow’s strained ties with the West.
Bellingcat became a thorn in the Kremlin’s side by detailing its alleged crimes during the wars in Syria and Ukraine.
It worked with the Russian investigative team at The Insider to name the first of the two Skripal suspects as GRU agent Anatoly Chepiga last month.
Putin says former double agent Sergei Skripal is a traitor
Bellingcat said Chepiga was decorated in 2014 with the nation’s top award in a secret ceremony at the Kremlin.
“While Alexander Mishkin’s true persona has an even sparser digital footprint than Anatoly Chepiga’s, Bellingcat has been able to establish certain key facts from his background,” it wrote.
The group showed an apparent scan of his real national ID card – called a passport in Russia – from 2001.

Mishkin was identified there as having been born in July 1979 in the northwestern region of Arkhangelsk.
Bellingcat said he graduated from one of Russia’s elite Military Medical Academies with the qualification to become a doctor for the Russian naval armed forces.
“During his medical studies, Mishkin was recruited by the GRU, and by 2010 had relocated to Moscow, where he received his undercover identity – including a second national ID and travel passport – under the alias Alexander Petrov,” Bellingcat said.
Mishkin was said to have made repeated trips to Ukraine and had even stated the GRU headquarters as his home address.

Bellingcat said it gathered its information from open sources and “testimony from people familiar with the person”.
The two suspects gave a bizarre interview to a Russian TV channel after the UK government released CCTV footage of their trip to Salisbury around the very time the Skripals were poisoned.
They explained that they went to the small town as tourists and had always wanted to see its tower.
The interview was not only widely mocked but also left security analysts at a loss to explain why Russia would stage-manage their hapless TV appearance in the first place.
One theory suggested by British intelligence was that Russian President Vladimir Putin wanted to publicly punish the two men for both fumbling their assignment and getting caught.
‘It’s famous for its 123-metre spire’: Russian poison suspects say they were in Salisbury to admire cathedral, not kill ex-spy
British Security Minister Ben Wallace said on Tuesday that recent failings by Russian military intelligence have made it easy to laugh at its spies but the West should not underestimate the skills of the Kremlin’s once mighty espionage services.
British, Dutch and US officials have also accused the GRU of trying to hack the computers of international agencies, masterminding a devastating 2017 cyberattack on Ukraine and being behind stolen emails that roiled the 2016 US presidential election.
Last week, authorities in the Netherlands alleged the GRU tried and failed into the world’s chemical weapons watchdog, the Organisation for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons.
The US Justice Department also charged seven GRU officers in an alleged international hacking rampage that targeted more than 250 athletes, a Pennsylvania-based nuclear energy company, a Swiss chemical laboratory and the chemical weapons watchdog.
Additional reporting by Associated Press, Reuters


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Russia

‘Tourist’ blamed for Skripal poisoning in Britain named as military doctor for Russia’s GRU intelligence service

Online investigative journalists claim that the Russian who entered Britain under the apparent alias of Alexander Petrov is actually Dr Alexander Yevgenyevich Mishkin

epa07017007 (FILE) - An undated handout photo made available by the British London Metropolitan Police (MPS) showing both suspects, Alexander Petrov (R) and Ruslan Boshirov (L), at Salisbury train station at 16:11hrs (BST) on 03 March 2018 (reissued 13 September 2018). An interview with two men identifying themselves as Ruslan Boshirov and Alexander Petrov was released on 13 September 2018 by Russian TV station Russia Today (RT). In the interview, the two men who are the main susspects in the Salisbury Novichok poisoning cases say they were innocent and had visited Salisbury only as tourists. EPA-EFE/LONDON METROPOLITAN POLICE / HANDOUT HANDOUT EDITORIAL USE ONLY/NO SALES HANDOUT EDITORIAL USE ONLY/NO SALES

A screengrab taken on September 13, 2018, from footage broadcast by Russia's state broadcaster Russia Today (RT), shows two men, purported to be Alexander Petrov and Ruslan Boshirov taking part in a television interview. - Two men accused by London of poisoning former spy Sergei Skripal told Russian media on Thursday they visited the British city of Salisbury for tourist purposes and denied having anything to do with the murder attempt. (Photo by HO / RUSSIA TODAY / AFP) / RESTRICTED TO EDITORIAL USE - MANDATORY CREDIT " AFP PHOTO / RUSSIA TODAY (RT)" - NO MARKETING NO ADVERTISING CAMPAIGNS - DISTRIBUTED AS A SERVICE TO CLIENTS - NO ARCHIVES - NO USE AFTER 30 DAYS FROM SEPTEMBER 30

This undated handout image issued by Bellingcat reportedly shows photos of Alexander Yevgenyevich Mishkin over the years. Photo: Bellingcat via AP

Russia’s Putin calls former double agent Sergei Skripal a ‘traitor’ and a ‘scumbag’

Russia’s President Vladimir Putin speaking at a Russian Energy Week forum in Moscow on October 3, 2018. Photo: EPA

TOPSHOT - A handout picture taken on Fisherton Road in Salisbury, west of London on March 4, 2018, and released by the British Metropolitan Police Service in London on September 5, 2018, shows Alexander Petrov (R) and Ruslan Boshirov, who are wanted by British police in connection with the nerve agent attack on former Russian spy Sergei Skripal and his daughter Yulia. - British prosecutors said Wednesday they have obtained a European arrest warrant for two Russians blamed for a nerve agent attack on a former spy in the city of Salisbury. Police identified Alexander Petrov and Ruslan Boshirov as the men who tried to kill Russian former double agent Sergei Skripal and his daughter Yulia with Novichok in March 2018. (Photo by HO / Metropolitan Police Service / AFP) / RESTRICTED TO EDITORIAL USE - MANDATORY CREDIT " AFP PHOTO / Metropolitan Police Service" - NO MARKETING NO ADVERTISING CAMPAIGNS - DISTRIBUTED AS A SERVICE TO CLIENTS

epa06746496 (FILE) - Sergei Skripal (L) talks from a defendants cage to his lawyer during a hearing at the Moscow District Military Court in Moscow, Russia, 09 August 2006 (reissued 18 May 2018). According to media reports on 18 May 2018, Skripal, a former Russian intelligence officer, has been released from hospital after allegedly being poisened with nerve agent in Salisbury on 04 March 2018. EPA-EFE/YURY SENATOROV RUSSIA OUT / BEST QUALITY AVAILABLE

Two Russian suspects in Skripal poisoning are ‘not criminals’, says Putin

‘We know who they are,’ says Russian leader at forum in Vladivostok, adding that the men are civilians

FILE PHOTO: Alexander Petrov and Ruslan Boshirov, who were formally accused of attempting to murder former Russian intelligence officer Sergei Skripal and his daughter Yulia in Salisbury, are seen in an image handed out by the Metropolitan Police in London, Britain September 5, 2018. Metroplitan Police handout via REUTERS/File Photo FOR EDITORIAL USE ONLY. NOT FOR SALE FOR MARKETING OR ADVERTISING CAMPAIGNS THIS IMAGE HAS BEEN SUPPLIED BY A THIRD PARTY. IT IS DISTRIBUTED, EXACTLY AS RECEIVED BY REUTERS, AS A SERVICE TO CLIENTS

Russian President Vladimir Putin at the forum in Vladivostok. Photo: AFP

UK has identified Russian suspects in Novichok nerve poison attack on ex-spy Skripal and daughter: report

Members of the emergency services in green biohazard suits work to afix the tent over the bench where Sergei and Yulia Skripal were found on March 4 in critical condition in Salisbury, southern England, on March 8. Photo: AFP

This undated image taken from the Facebook page of Yulia Skripal on March 8, 2018 allegedly shows Yulia Skripal, the daughter of former Russian spy Sergei Skripal, in an unknown location. British detectives were scrambling on March 8 to uncover who poisoned a Russian former double-agent and his daughter with a nerve agent, as doctors battled to save their lives and that of a policeman who also fell ill after coming to their aid. Sergei Skripal, 66, who moved to Britain in a 2010 spy swap, is in a critical condition in hospital along with his daughter Yulia after they collapsed on a bench outside a shopping centre on Sunday. The brazen poisoning in the southwestern English city of Salisbury is already being linked with Russia by British politicians and the media, sparking an angry response in Moscow. / AFP PHOTO / FACEBOOK PAGE OF YULIA SKRIPAL / - / RESTRICTED TO EDITORIAL USE - MANDATORY CREDIT "AFP PHOTO / FACEBOOK ACCOUNT OF YULIA SKRIPAL" - NO MARKETING NO ADVERTISING CAMPAIGNS - D

Former Russian military intelligence colonel Sergei Skripal attends a hearing at the Moscow District Military Court in Moscow on August 9, 2006. Sergei Skripal, a former Russian double agent whose mysterious collapse in England sparked concerns of a possible poisoning by Moscow, has been living in Britain since a high-profile spy swap in 2010. Police were probing his exposure to an unknown substance, which left him unconscious on a bench in the city of Salisbury and saw media draw parallels to the case of Alexander Litvinenko, an ex-spy who died of radioactive polonium poisoning in 2006. / AFP PHOTO / Kommersant Photo / Yuri SENATOROV / Russia OUT

Poisoned ex-spy’s daughter Yulia Skripal breaks silence, hopes to return to Russia one day

Yulia Skripal, who was poisoned in Salisbury along with her father, Russian spy Sergei Skripal, speaks to media representatives in London, on Wednesday. Photo: Agence France-Presse

A detail of a signed, handwritten statement by Yulia Skripal, in London, Wednesday May 23, 2018. Yulia Skripal says recovery has been slow and painful, in first interview since nerve agent poisoning. (Dylan Martinez/Pool via AP)

Yulia Skripal, who was poisoned in Salisbury along with her father, Russian spy Sergei Skripal, speaks to Reuters in London, Britain, May 23, 2018. REUTERS/Dylan Martinez

Yulia Skripal during an interview in London, Wednesday May 23, 2018. Yulia Skripal says recovery has been slow and painful, in first interview since nerve agent poisoning. (Dylan Martinez/Pool via AP)

A scan of a signed handwritten statement in English by Yulia Skripal, who was poisoned in Salisbury along with her father, Russian spy Sergei Skripal, is pictured in London, on May 23, 2018. The daughter of Russian spy Sergei Skripal, Yulia Skripal has said that she wants to return to her country "in the longer term", despite being poisoned with a nerve agent, according to news reports. / AFP PHOTO / POOL / STR

Sergei Skripal, the former Russian spy poisoned by nerve agent, discharged from British hospital

Former Russian military intelligence colonel Sergei Skripal. Photo: AFP

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Russia & Central Asia

Online investigative journalists claim that the Russian who entered Britain under the apparent alias of Alexander Petrov is actually Dr Alexander Yevgenyevich Mishkin


The second of two Russians who Britain blames for the poisoning of former Russian spy Sergei Skripal was named by investigative website Bellingcat on Monday as a military doctor for Russia’s GRU intelligence service.


Britain

Vladimir Putin

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Espionage

‘Tourist’ blamed for Skripal poisoning in Britain named as military doctor for Russia’s GRU intelligence service

.css-1c6uqr6{color:inherit;font-weight:inherit;font-size:inherit;font-family:inherit;line-height:inherit;overflow-wrap:break-word;}Online investigative journalists claim that the Russian who entered Britain under the apparent alias of Alexander Petrov is actually Dr Alexander Yevgenyevich Mishkin

Online investigative journalists claim that the Russian who entered Britain under the apparent alias of Alexander Petrov is actually Dr Alexander Yevgenyevich Mishkin