Sergei Skripal case

[Roger]

It seems they are about to take the roof off Sergei Skripal's house and garage to later replace it ? I don't quite understand why ?

It should be going up for sale one day at a knockdown price   
Somehow I don't think Sergei will be moving back . . . .

https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2019/jan/08/sergei-skripals-house-to-be-dismantled-after-novichok-attack

[Coolkorat]

It seems they are about to take the roof off Sergei Skripal's house and garage to later replace it? I don't quite understand why?

Novichok must be really horrible stuff: even trace amounts must be deadly, and to be concerned about the roof means there is an aerosol factor (that it can be exhaled). I am sure it is not just the roof going: everything from the ground up is going. This was a properly sh*tty thing that Russian military intelligence did. Second time they've used deadly chemical agents in the UK causing widespread chaos. If they didn't like him why not hire a car and just run him over (or any other simple, non-collateral option). Or smuggle in a gun and shoot him. 

[Roger]

The Guardian says 

“Once the covered frame is in place, the deconstruction work is expected to take around two weeks. This specialist work will be carried out by the military team. When that work is completed, contractors will move on site to build a replacement roof for the house and adjoining garage.”

And CK, as for cars and guns, these buggers don't need any more bright ideas from you !    ATB

[Coolkorat]

And CK, as for cars and guns, these buggers don't need any more bright ideas from you !    ATB

I'm not that bright Roger! It's not exactly rocket science....! Unlike Novichok, which clearly is rocket science, as was the poisoning of Alexander Litvinenko with polonium, a highly radioactive isotope. Probably the most toxic poison known to man when swallowed or inhaled – more than 100bn times more deadly than hydrogen cyanide. And costing millions. See https://www.theguardian.com/world/2016/mar/06/alexander-litvinenko-and-the-most-radioactive-towel-in-history

[Roger]

CK -''I'm not that bright Roger!'' - no comment.

The Guardian reports they ARE going to rebuild the Skripal roof/house (pls acknowledge?) But who the hell is gonna wanna live there ? 

My ole' Dad used to bemoan 'bright ideas' and 'being too clever by arf' - the latter applies to these morons who ordered the Litvinenko and Skripal events. And far easier ways to do the job as you say - bizarre.

On the wider front, there was a lot of evidence they were responsible for downing that Malaysia flight over Ukraine if I remember - and we go to play bl**dy football with them ? Bah humbug 

[Coolkorat]

The Guardian reports they ARE going to rebuild the Skripal roof/house (pls acknowledge?) But who the hell is gonna wanna live there ? 

It certainly does, and the BBC said the same thing about the roof. Can they be certain they can clean the walls and floor, but not certain about the roof? Better to knock the thing down and leave an empty plot. Make it a community garden.

On the wider front, there was a lot of evidence they were responsible for downing that Malaysia flight over Ukraine if I remember - and we go to play bl**dy football with them ? Bah humbug 

Putin acts with complete impunity safe in the knowledge he can get away with anything. The world desperately needs a strong, moral, statesmanlike leader. We can only hope a candidate appears soon!

[jivvy]

The world desperately needs a strong, moral, statesmanlike leader. We can only hope a candidate appears soon!

We already have a Dynamic Duo waiting in the wings

[Roger]

CK - yes it seems strange. The 'Fred West' solution would have been better ?
https://uk.images.search.yahoo.com/search/images?p=fred+west+house+of+horrors&fr=
Makes sense to me 

Jivvy - Yes that's very reassuring - NOT !
Let's hope that Duo stay 'in the wings', or better, fall off 'em 

[Coolkorat]

Jivvy - I see that's the 'photo edition'. Some poor misguided snapper somewhere must be undergoing intensive therapy....

[Roger]

R.I.P. James le Mesurier - the 'White Helmets" :-

""Among those who speculate on Russian involvement, there are echoes of other sudden deaths involving journalists, lawyers and aid workers who have crossed the Kremlin and ended up falling – or being thrown – from high windows.

Maksim Borodin, a Russian journalist who had exposed state corruption and highlighted the work of Russian mercenaries in Syria, died last year after allegedly tumbling from his balcony in the city of Yekaterinburg. Twelve months earlier, Nikolai Gorokhov, lawyer for the family of Sergei Magnitsky – who died in jail in 2009 after exposing massive tax fraud by government officials – fell from a fourth-storey window. The authorities alleged, apparently with a straight face, that he'd been trying to move a bathtub.

In 2007, Ivan Safronov, who was investigating the sale of Russian arms to Iran and Syria, plunged from a fifth-floor window (it was ruled a suicide) and two years later Olga Kotovskaya, a broadcaster who had tangled with the government, fell from a 14th floor window in another incident ruled a suicide.

At least one Briton has met a similar fate. In 2014, property developer Scott Young, who was allegedly indebted to shadowy Russian mafia figures, died after falling four storeys from his London penthouse and being impaled on iron railings.

It is perhaps little wonder that Le Mesurier's friends and colleagues in the human rights field smell a rat.""

https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-7678641/Just-truth-brutal-end-quiet-British-hero-James-Le-Mesurier.html

Falling out of a Balcony whilst moving a bath ? 
Pull the other one Russia . . . 

I wonder how the Skripals are doing ?

[Roger]

The inquest into the death of Dawn Sturgess is under way.
I wonder how Sergei and Yulia are doing? Last I heard they were 'holed up' in the UK somewhere - that can't be much fun, particularly for Yulia. All this as Putin lines up decades more power 

Michael Mansfield QC, for the Sturgess family -  “The use of novichok in Salisbury was the first aggressive use of a nerve agent in Europe since the second world war. It put hundreds of members of the British public at risk and killed Ms Sturgess. The issue of who was responsible for it is a matter of almost unparalleled public concern.”

https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2020/jul/14/novichok-may-left-salisbury-deliberately-high-court-dawn-sturgess

[Roger]

For me, it's very hard to believe that the cowardly and despicable President Putin, with his track record, has had nothing to do with this     

Thankfully Mr Navalny has been taken to Berlin where he may have a chance . . . . Navalny is simply an opposition Politician. How can Russia be accepted at the 'Table' by any other Nation ?

"A woman who took this selfie with Russian opposition leader Alexei Navalny told last night of how the arch-critic of President Putin collapsed in agony just minutes later. She added: 'There were two young people with Alexei, a young man and a young woman, and they were screaming, "Don't shut your eyes Lesha [Navalny's nickname], breathe, breathe!" 'He didn't sound like a human being the way he yelled.' After an emergency landing at Omsk airport, about 500 miles south of Tomsk, Mr Navalny was taken to a local hospital and put into an induced coma."

https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-8654453/Pictured-Vladimir-Putins-arch-foe-Alexei-Navalny-minutes-collapsing-suspected-poisoning.html