Russia’s foreign ministry mocked Theresa May over her conclusion that it was “highly likely” Moscow was responsible for the nerve agent attack on Sergei Skripal and his daughter Yulia.
In a post on Twitter, the ministry’s official account used the hashtag #HighlyLikelyRussia – which has been used on social media as the basis of jokes for things to blame Moscow for.
READ MORE: Russia dismisses Theresa May's ultimatum over chemical attack as "circus show"
The ministry of foreign affairs’ message said “sincere thanks to Mrs May for #HighlyLikelyRussia” along with a video suggesting the country was to blame for the recent snow to fall in the UK.
The message came as the ministry – through its ambassador in London Alexander Yakovenko – faced a midnight deadline to explain how military-grade Russian nerve agent came to be used in the Salisbury incident.
The Kremlin has denied responsibility and Moscow’s response has been to appear to taunt the UK.
READ MORE: May's ultimatum to Putin: respond credibly or face "full range" of UK measures
Kirill Kleymenov, a presenter on Russian state TV, advised “traitors” against moving to Britain, adding: “Something is wrong there. Maybe it’s the climate, but in recent years there have been too many strange incidents with grave outcomes there.”
And another prominent broadcaster, Dmitry Kiselyov, suggested that the UK may have been behind the poisoning of the former double agent.
As a source, Mr Skripal was of little value, but “as a poisoning victim he is very useful” to harden British attitudes against Russia, he said.
Why are you making commenting on The Herald only available to subscribers?
It should have been a safe space for informed debate, somewhere for readers to discuss issues around the biggest stories of the day, but all too often the below the line comments on most websites have become bogged down by off-topic discussions and abuse.
heraldscotland.com is tackling this problem by allowing only subscribers to comment.
We are doing this to improve the experience for our loyal readers and we believe it will reduce the ability of trolls and troublemakers, who occasionally find their way onto our site, to abuse our journalists and readers. We also hope it will help the comments section fulfil its promise as a part of Scotland's conversation with itself.
We are lucky at The Herald. We are read by an informed, educated readership who can add their knowledge and insights to our stories.
That is invaluable.
We are making the subscriber-only change to support our valued readers, who tell us they don't want the site cluttered up with irrelevant comments, untruths and abuse.
In the past, the journalist’s job was to collect and distribute information to the audience. Technology means that readers can shape a discussion. We look forward to hearing from you on heraldscotland.com
Comments & Moderation
Readers’ comments: You are personally liable for the content of any comments you upload to this website, so please act responsibly. We do not pre-moderate or monitor readers’ comments appearing on our websites, but we do post-moderate in response to complaints we receive or otherwise when a potential problem comes to our attention. You can make a complaint by using the ‘report this post’ link . We may then apply our discretion under the user terms to amend or delete comments.
Post moderation is undertaken full-time 9am-6pm on weekdays, and on a part-time basis outwith those hours.
Read the rules hereLast Updated:
Report this comment Cancel