WASHINGTON – The GCHQ intelligence chief’s warning came hot on the heelsof a UN Security Council meeting where the UK envoy claimed that theSalisbury poisoning attack was perpetrated by two GRU officers.
Speaking at the Billington Cybersecurity Conference in Washington, JeremyFlemming, the head of the Government Communications Headquarters (GCHQ), aUK intelligence agency, said that the organization could “deploy the fullrange of tools from across our national security apparatus” to counterRussia’s military intelligence agency GRU and its agents.
The GCHQ chief further claimed that the UK was “ready to reject theKremlin’s brazen determination to undermine the international rules-basedorder.”
“Since March, the Police with the full support of the intelligencecommunity have led a painstaking and highly complex investigation into whathappened in Wiltshire. We have ascertained exactly who was responsible andthe methods they used. […] And I was pleased to see yesterday that two GRUoperatives were named and arrest warrants issued. The threat from Russia isreal. It’s active,” he added.
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On Wednesday, UK police made public images of two men, identified asAlexander Petrov and Ruslan Boshirov, who are now believed to be suspectsin the alleged poisoning of Sergei and Yulia Skripal in Salisbury. Thepurported footage showing the suspected individuals strolling throughSalisbury was later published by the MailOnline.
