LONDON (AP) — The United Kingdom moved Monday to impose sanctions on nine Russian individuals and organizations accused of developing chemical weapons used in two high-profile poisoning cases — one targeting opposition leader Alexei Navalny and another aimed at a former Russian intelligence officer living in England.
Britain’s Foreign Office announced the measures against seven individuals and two scientific research institutes, saying they played roles in producing the epibatidine toxin used to poison Navalny at an Arctic prison facility in 2024, as well as the Novichok nerve agent deployed in a 2018 attack in the English city of Salisbury. That attack targeted former Russian spy Sergei Skripal and left him and his daughter seriously injured. A local woman named Dawn Sturgess also died as a result of the attack.
Among those sanctioned were the Russian state scientific research institute SC Signal and GNIII VM, also known as the State Scientific Research and Testing Institute for Military Medicine, along with multiple senior officials and scientists.
Foreign Secretary Yvette Cooper condemned the actions, stating that “Russia’s repeated use of chemical weapons is a sickening violation of international law and a direct threat to global security.”
Separately on Monday, Britain’s defense ministry released photographs showing U.K. F-35 fighter jets intercepting a Russian Bear-F maritime patrol aircraft that had approached a British carrier strike group in the Norwegian Sea. The HMS Prince of Wales and other British ships are currently operating in the Arctic as part of NATO missions.
According to the ministry, the incident occurred on Thursday when the Russian aircraft “passed at low altitude and unnecessarily close to HMS Prince of Wales and dropped a large number of sonobuoys in close proximity to the carrier.” Sonobuoys are floating monitoring devices that use sonar technology to detect submarines and other vessels.
“This activity was unsafe and unprofessional. The Russian aircraft was intercepted and escorted by two UK F-35 jets from HMS Prince of Wales until it left the area,” the defense ministry said in an official statement.
