There are many people who ask, does Jeremy Corbyn have a point about Russia? There are even more people who say, more evidence was needed to say Putin did it. Why should he have initiated a plan which is not only unnecessary (if this double agent posed a danger for Putin's Russia, he would be never allowed to move to Britain) but doomed to fail?
Putin is a clever guy, and he's not in desperate need to show how tough he can be, especially after his newest, deeply shocking yearly address about the state of the nation.
The verdict of a German scientist
It's not a point to point the finger of scorn on Russia, and people who are doing that are wrong. The left-wing politician and bio-weapon expert Jan Van Aken, in an interview with German television channel tagesschau.de, he said that the evidence is "wafer-thin," because at least one other great power (USA) may be involved.
Jan van Aken continued to sit for the Left Party from 2009 to 2017 as a Member of Parliament (Bundestag) and is since 2016, has been the member of the Federal Executive of the party. He has a Ph.D. in biology and previously worked for many years as a Greenpeace activist and from 2004 to 2006 as a biological weapons inspector for the UN.
An important and almost unknown role in US military
In August 1999, defence officials and military personnel from the US travelled to Uzbekistan to help dismantle and decontaminate one of the former Soviet Union's largest chemical weapons testing facilities. It was revealed that the chemical research institute in western Uzbekistan was a major research site for a new generation of chemical weapons, known as Novichok.
According to Mr. van Aken, their role was, in fact, not limited to some functions referring to preserving peace and security in the world. They would be fools if they were not collecting samples of those poisoning agents.
This could be justified by the need to find antidotes or other protective measures in the laboratories. But they could also explain if needed, that they must be well informed to protect the free world and examine the entire production process very closely.
Russians or not the Russians?
The German expert also said in this interview that the grave incident was just as useful to Mr. Putin as to Mrs. May. Further attacks against Russia, especially the new sanctions, can only strengthen support for the Kremlin's strongman in his homeland. And for Theresa May, this would be a precious gift, because she's very weakened in domestic politics, and suddenly most of the British people and many allied governments are giving now whole-hearted support to her because of this foreign policy conflict.
Van Aken: "On the other hand, from Russia's point of view, it would be unwise to use Nowichok, because they could have used another substance, such as sarin, and the suspicion would not have fallen so directly on Russia."
Is the demand of the German scientist viable?
"I think the most important demand, also of the (German) Federal Government, must now be that the whole case should be handed over to the Organisation for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW).
What is the purpose of the Chemical Weapons Convention, in which the procedures are set exactly for such allegations? And there's just not such a 24-hour ultimatum, as Theresa May put it, but there are ten days left to investigate the proofs, and there are ten days you have to give the Russians now to answer too."
In my personal opinion
It is important to note that Putin doesn't need an increase in support from Russian voters. First, it was already many months ago and several times bigger than the support for any other presidential candidate. Secondly, such methods could have a boycott of the World Cup in Russia as result, and that would be not in his favour. This kind of "victory" would not be rated positively among broad sections of the population.
Russia lost control over the major nerve agents facility long ago. There are no grounds to believe that the UK prime minister or her advisers did not know the basic facts about it. And what I'm asking is: who wants the Third World War pretty soon? But perhaps our attention should be focused on a somehow better possibility. Under the pretext of solidarity, a trade war between the United States, Britain and Russia, China etc. could begin. Do you remember Tony Blair, Donald Rumsfeld and the Anglo-American occupation of Iraq?
