Russia: West made a hundred Novichok agents over years

At least a hundred chemical agents containing compositions similar to Novichok nerve gas have been made by Western countries since mid-1990s, a report on the Russian Foreign ministry website revealed.

Moscow has been one the first countries to sign and implement the Chemical Weapons Convention on January 13, 1993, the Foreign Ministry of Russia said.

Russia’s chemical weapons’ elimination went through strictest international control and got completed on September 27, 2017, the Foreign Ministry said.

It was on October 11, 2017 that the director-general of the OPCW’s Secretariat confirmed the final elimination of such weapons in Russia, the Foreign Ministry added.

PressTV-UK potential origin of ‘Novichok’ nerve agent: Russia

Russia says the substance used in the poisoning of former double agent Skripal may have originated from the countries studying the 'Novichok' nerve agent, including the UK.

Since the compounds of Novichok have been a matter of concern, its structure was presented in the data base of the American National Standards Institute in 1998. "The whole family of toxic chemicals that eventually emerged on its basis does not fall under the CWC operation," the Russian Foreign Ministry said.

“Some twenty Western countries have carried out research on the effects of Novichok substances family and their effects,” the Russian Foreign Ministry said.

The Foreign Ministry added that it is hard to determine which country the type of agent present in Salibury has come from and that these compounds have been have been broadly spread in the west.

It was on March 4 when former Russian double agent Sergey Skripal and his daughter were poisoned by a nerve agent in Salisbury, a city in England.

British authorities say Moscow is to blame for this to happen and this has contributed to major responses by Western countries taking unified action and expelling Russian diplomats from their respective embassies.

Denying any involvement, Russia took the same measure against those countries.

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