The OPCW, the international chemical weapons watchdog, said its team “notes that the toxic chemical was of high purity. The latter is concluded from the almost complete absence of impurities.”
Britain has accused Russia of attempting to murder the Skripals using Novichok. Russia has repeatedly denied involvement in the attack, seeking to blame Britain instead.
In a statement Thursday, Russian Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova said Moscow “will not take on faith any conclusions regarding the Skripal case until Russian experts are provided with access to the victims themselves, as well as to the materials mentioned in the OPCW’s expert report and the entire volume of information available to London.”
The OPCW sent a team of specialists to the UK last month to investigate the March 4 attack. The experts took samples from several locations as well as biomedical samples from the Skripals and police officer Nick Bailey, who was also exposed to the nerve agent.

UK Foreign Secretary Boris Johnson said the testing was carried out by “four independent, highly reputable laboratories around the world,” all of which “returned the same conclusive results.”
“There can be no doubt what was used and there remains no alternative explanation about who was responsible — only Russia has the means, motive and record,” Johnson said in a statement.
“In the interest of transparency, and because unlike the Russians we have nothing to hide, we have asked the OPCW to publish the executive summary for all to see and to circulate the full report to all state parties of the OPCW, including Russia.

“We will now work tirelessly with our partners to help stamp out the grotesque use of weapons of this kind and we have called a session of the OPCW Executive Council next Wednesday to discuss next steps. The Kremlin must give answers.”
The United Kingdom has called for a UN Security Council meeting to discuss the OPCW report, according to a tweet from the UK mission to the United Nations. The meeting is likely to take place next week, according to the tweet.
German Foreign Minister Heiko Maas urged Russia to answer “open questions” regarding the report and welcomed Britain’s call for a special OPCW executive council session next week.
“Based on the chemical analysis of the substance used, the United Kingdom has also explained in detail why Russia’s responsibility is very probable and there is no plausible alternative explanation,” Maas said in a statement. “Russia is now called upon to finally take on a constructive role and to answer.”
Russia lost a vote at the OPCW earlier this month to have a joint UK-Russian investigation into the Salisbury attack. Moscow has repeatedly complained that it has been denied information on the UK probe and access to the Skripals, as Russian citizens.
In a statement Wednesday, Yulia Skripal said she did not need help from Russian diplomats in the UK and cautioned the media that no one else speaks for her or her father, who is still in a British hospital. Yulia was discharged from the hospital on Monday.

In his first public speech as director of the UK surveillance agency GCHQ, Jeremy Fleming described the Salisbury attack as “sobering.”
“It demonstrates how reckless Russia is prepared to be,” he said. “How little the Kremlin cares for the international rules-based order. How comfortable they are at putting ordinary lives at risk.”
Fleming added that the “robust response” from the UK and the international community “shows the Kremlin that illegal acts have consequences.”
The chief executive of the Porton Down defense laboratory in the UK said earlier this month that scientists could not confirm where the nerve agent was made. The British government insisted that additional material from intelligence sources led it to the conclusion that Russia was behind the attack.
CNN’s Nathan Hodge, Nadine Schmidt and Richard Roth contributed to this report.

By Laura Smith-Spark and Simon Cullen, CNN
Updated 1523 GMT (2323 HKT) April 12, 2018

Find this story at 12 April 2018
Copyight https://edition.cnn.com/