The case of the poisoning of a former employee of the Russian GRU Sergei Skripal has already reached the international level. Great Britain accuses Russia of organizing the assassination attempt, and official Moscow denies its involvement in it. The British authorities have already promised to take action against the Russian side and punish it for its alleged activities on its territory. According to the British, S. Skripal suffered from a chemical warfare agent called Novichok.
For the first time, the name "Novichok" was sounded in the context of the latest events on March 12. British Prime Minister Theresa May, speaking in parliament, announced the use of a poisonous substance with a similar name. In addition, she immediately found a couple of opportunities to blame Russia. According to her, the recent assassination attempt was either perpetrated by the Russian state or was committed by it due to the loss of control over chemical weapons. However, as often happens, no sufficient evidence of the guilt or involvement of the Russian special services was provided.
Despite the increased interest from the world community, very little is known about the "Novichok" family of weapons of war. Moreover, almost all information about such weapons is obtained from one source, which, moreover, may not arouse much confidence. Nevertheless, this does not prevent the emergence of new publications, as well as the formation of unexpected versions. For example, by the forces of the foreign press, substances such as "Novichok" have already been able to "tie" to the high-profile murder of past years.
For the first time it became known about the poisonous gases of the "Novichok" line in September 1992. It was then that the newspaper "Moscow News" published an article "Poisoned Politics" written by Vil Mirzayanov, a former employee of the State Research Institute of Organic Chemistry and Technology (GOSNIIOKhT). In his article, V. Mirzayanov criticized the military and political leadership of Russia, and also accused him of violating existing international agreements on chemical weapons. He argued that the development and production of CWA in our country has not been phased out and continues.
It should be noted that quite remarkable events followed the publication of the article in Moskovskiye Novosti. A criminal case was opened against its author for divulging state secrets. The investigation lasted more than a year, but in the spring of 1994 the case was closed due to the absence of corpus delicti. Shortly thereafter, V. Mirzayanov took up political activities and is still in opposition to the federal authorities. In 1996, he left for the United States, where he continued his public and political work.
Information about the Novichok project was published by V. Mirzayanov not only in one of the Russian newspapers. Subsequently, the topic of the newest BOV was repeatedly raised by other publications, cited in the memoirs of an employee of GOSNIIOKHT, etc. Also, from a certain time in this context, some documents appeared, allegedly describing the technological process and the composition of the poisonous substance. Using all this data, you can try to get a big picture. However, one should not forget that the overwhelming majority of information was obtained from the same source, moreover, the suspect, at least, of bias.
It was reported that the development of new CWA started back in the seventies and continued until the early nineties, including after the appearance of the Soviet-American agreement on chemical weapons in 1990. Within the framework of the program with the "Foliant" code, Soviet specialists created more than a hundred new substances, but only a few of them had advantages over the existing ones. All of them were grouped into a conditional "Novichok" family. Despite the fact that work on such substances was completed, the USSR or Russia did not accept them into service.
According to other data, the result of the "Foliant" project was the emergence of three unitary chemical agents - A-232, A-234 and "Substance 33". Then, on their basis, they created five binary toxic substances with the general name "Novichok" and their own numbers. All these substances are classified as nerve agents and differ from older analogues in increased efficiency.
According to one version, the BOV called "Novichok" without an additional number was a Soviet version of the V-gas in a binary design. This substance allegedly reached production and from the beginning of the eighties was produced in Novocheboksarsk in relatively large batches.
On the basis of the agent A-232, a binary gas "Novichok-5" was created, which in terms of combat performance was 5-8 times superior to the older VX. Poisoning with such a substance was said to be extremely difficult to treat with the standard antidotes used for other CWS. "Novichok-5" could be produced in Volgograd and tested at one of the facilities of the Uzbek SSR.
A binary substance "Novichok-7" was created using the substance A-230. In terms of its volatility, it was supposedly comparable to soman, but at the same time it was significantly more toxic. Low-tonnage production and testing of the seventh Novichok, according to some reports, were carried out by the GOSNIIOKhT branch in Shikhany (Saratov region) and continued until 1993.
There are known references to the "Novice" with numbers 8 and 9, but almost nothing is known about them. According to the known data, such substances were indeed developed, but were not produced, tested or adopted for service.
In 1990, the United States and the USSR agreed to end the creation and production of chemical weapons. In January 1993, a number of countries, including Russia, signed a new Convention on the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons. In accordance with these documents, the countries participating in the agreements could no longer develop, produce and use chemical warfare agents. The substances already produced, in turn, had to be disposed of in a safe way. According to official data, by the time the Convention was signed, the Russian chemical industry had stopped developing and producing CWA. Together with other projects, the "Folio" was also closed. Now the enterprises of the industry had to solve a new problem and dispose of the existing 40 thousand tons of chemical weapons.
Until a certain time, information about the substances of the "Novichok" family was extremely scarce. Only one source was known about their existence, and later there were approximate data on the composition of the family. However, the formulas of the substances remained unknown, and until now specialists have to rely solely on estimates and assumptions. Moreover, some of the assumptions are refuted and criticized.
It is curious that shortly after the article in Moscow News, the American edition of The Baltimore Sun published its material on Soviet and Russian projects in the field of chemical weapons. The author of the article “Russia still doing secret work on chemical arms Research goes on as government seeks U. N. ban”claimed that he was able to talk with representatives of the Soviet chemical industry and find out some details of the latest work. In particular, it was The Baltimore Sun who first announced the accident during the development of the "Novice".
It was alleged that in 1987 a ventilation failure occurred in one of the laboratories working on the Novichok-5 project. The concentration of the toxic substance quickly reached dangerous levels, and the chemist who worked with it was seriously injured. They managed to take him to the hospital on time and provide the necessary assistance. However, the specialist was unconscious for 10 days, and the treatment took another six months. The chemist was unable to return to work and was left disabled. Later it was announced that the poisoned specialist was Andrei Zheleznyakov. According to the foreign press, he passed away in 1993.
Subsequently, no new reports of accidents or the use of gases of the Novichok family were published. However, the main sources of information about these BOV continued to talk about them, mostly repeating already known information. The most interesting data - first of all, the chemical composition of toxic substances, production technology, etc. - remained unknown, and so far only assumptions and estimates appear in this context.
According to official data, our country stopped developing new chemical warfare agents in the early nineties, after the first agreement with the United States. Shortly thereafter, a program for the disposal of existing stocks started, which was successfully completed last year. The completion of these works was announced on September 27, 2017. Soon, the controlling structures of the Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons confirmed this. In the context of the Foliant project, this means that Novichok gases, if they were released, were disposed of in accordance with their obligations.
However, it should be noted that the Novichok gas line did not appear in the reports on the destruction of CWA stockpiles. Once again, it is worth recalling that their existence became known from unofficial sources, and they were not mentioned in the documents on the recycling program. Obviously, for the most banal reason - because they did not exist.
A hypothetical project of Soviet scientists with a dubious past was recalled just a few days ago. On March 4, a former GRU officer, previously convicted of espionage, Sergei Skripal and his daughter Yulia, were admitted to a hospital in the British city of Salisbury. According to official figures from the British Interior Ministry, tests showed that the victims were poisoned with a nerve agent, but the specific type of poison was not specified.
On March 12, Prime Minister Theresa May made a presentation on the situation in the British Parliament. It was she who first pronounced the name "Newbie" with reference to the recent incident. Soon, British officials demanded from Russia complete data on the Novichok BOV development program. Also in the official statements there were threats of an economic and political nature, directly related to "Russian aggression" and Russia's alleged guilt in recent events.
On March 14, a meeting of the UN Security Council took place, during which London officially accused Moscow of violating the current Chemical Weapons Convention. The next day, the head of the British Foreign Office Boris Johnson said that Great Britain had some evidence of Russia's involvement in the poisoning of S. Skripal.
The reaction of the foreign press to recent events is of some interest. Some publications - as expected, differing in a clear anti-Russian stance - tried to find or think out evidence of the use of Novichkov in the past, not relying only on the statements of V. Mirzayanov or the publications of The Baltimore Sun.
For example, several media outlets at once recalled the death of businessman Ivan Kivelidi, who was poisoned in August 1995. As then the investigation found out, the poisonous substance was applied by the killers to the membrane of the telephone tube. During the conversation, the substance was sprayed onto the skin and into the respiratory tract. The poison could not kill the victim right away, but the businessman had several chronic diseases aggravated, and a few days later he died. Also, his secretary-assistant, who was in contact with the poisoned telephone, passed away. According to some reports, the investigating officers who worked in I. Kivelidi's office also felt unwell.
A number of details of the criminal case were never published, which became a good ground for speculation and outright speculation. Thus, it was previously stated that the poisonous substance could have been synthesized at the GOSNIIOKhT branch in Shikhany. In the same place, according to V. Mirzayanov, "Novicheski" were produced. Such "facts" allowed some domestic and foreign publications to suggest that I. Kivelidi was poisoned precisely with the use of BOV of the "Novichok" line. It is hardly worth reminding that this version does not have any factual evidence and is more like an attempt to "work out an informational occasion" in the right way.
It is obvious that the recent statements of the British leadership were not the last, and they may even be followed by real steps. Russia, in turn, will defend its interests and fight unfair accusations. How exactly events in the international arena will develop and how far the opposing sides will reach is anyone's guess. Only one thing is clear: the situation will worsen and the countries will not be able to improve relations for a long time.
While politicians are sorting out the accusations, it is worthwhile to once again draw attention to the main features of the situation around the Novichok substances. The existence of such BOV is known only from a couple of sources, which are often criticized for bias and therefore can hardly be considered reliable or objective. At the same time, Russian officials are denying the existence of Novichkov. Moreover, the lack of chemical weapons in Russia is confirmed by the regulatory authorities.
A few days ago, the opinion about the existence of Novichok substances was supported by the British authorities, which, however, still does not allow him to outweigh the arguments of the other side. In addition, so far we are only talking about statements by officials who are not directly related to the investigation, as well as about the absence of real evidence or, at least, their publication.
It is easy to see that the situation around the recent poisoning of a former employee of the Russian special services has already moved from the category of simple criminal cases to the political sphere. As a result, the actions of official London will now be determined not only by the need to identify the poisoners, but also by the political goals of the government. And in such a situation, not every proof or refutation will be considered as such. As we can see, information about the absence of Novichok BOV or other types of chemical weapons in Russia has already become a victim of this approach, and is no longer of interest to the British.
It is not known what will happen next and how the situation in the international arena will deteriorate. The only thing that can please in such circumstances is the extreme carelessness of the British side. All known data suggests that the UK version is at least illogical and has problems. Moreover, from some points of view, it looks completely erroneous, since it is based on inaccurate information. However, the British authorities have already done and said too much to stop and admit a mistake.
