Could Salisbury spy Sergei Skripal’s mysterious final car journey hold the key to explaining nerve agent attack?
FOUR missing hours could be the crucial piece police need to crack just how a Russian spy and his daughter were poisoned.
Counter terror police tracked the final movements of Sergei Skripal and his daughter Yulia were found slumped on a park bench – with a round-the-clock probe examining just how the pair were exposed to the nerve agent.
Cops yesterday released an estimated timeline of the pair’s movements, revealing that they had not been seen between 9.15am and 1.30pm on March 4.
It wasn’t until then that they resurfaced at a Sainsbury’s upper level car park, going on to dine at Zizzi restaurant in Salisbury.
Appealing for witnesses to come forward, Met Assistant Commissioner Neil Basu said: “We are learning more about Sergei and Yulia’s movements but we need to be clearer around their exact movements on the morning of the incident.
“We need to establish Sergei and Yulia’s movements during the morning, before they headed to the town centre.”
It comes as cops revealed a new image of Sergei’s burgundy BMW 320D saloon as part of their counter terror investigation into the attack, with fears that that Russian and his daughter Yulia were poisoned after a toxic substance was smeared on the door handle.
The timeline appears to back up the suggestion the father and daughter visited the graves of their family the morning they were poisoned.
Sergei, 66, and his 33-year-old daughter Yulia, 33, remain in a critical condition.
A Wiltshire Police officer – Detective Sergeant Nick Bailey, who was among those first to respond to the incident – was also taken ill and remains in a serious but stable condition in hospital.
Hundreds of police officers have now doubled down as part of their investigation, appealing for anyone who may have seen the father and daughter before they were found ill.
Police have revealed that 400 witnesses have already come forward, with 250 specialist officers working around the clock as part of the probe.
More than 760 exhibits are being examined as part of the round the clock probe, while 4,000 hours of CCTV are being examined.
But progress could take months, with Met Assistant Commissioner Basu saying: “They are making good progress in what is a painstaking investigation that is likely to be ongoing for weeks, if not months.”
The results of tests by independent investigators from the Organisation for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons on samples of the nerve agent used in the Salisbury attack are expected to take a “minimum of two weeks”, the Foreign Office said.
CCTV was revealed earlier this week, showing the chilling moment that Sergei Skripal drove down a Salisbury street in the hours before his attempted assassination.
A security camera at the Devizes Inn pub caught Skripal driving towards the city centre in his maroon BMW 3-Series at 1.35pm on March 4.
Anti-terror cops seized the CCTV footage in a bid to gain information about his whereabouts in the 40 minutes between leaving his house and arriving in the city centre.
As police continue their investigations, relations between Russia and the UK have continued to freeze.
It was a retaliatory move for Britain expelling 23 Russians this week.
The Kremlin has also decided to close the British Council in Russia and to withdraw permission for Britain to open a general consulate in St Petersburg.
The measures were announced after Brit ambassador in Moscow Laurie Bristow was summoned to the Russian Foreign Ministry this morning amid a deepening row over the attack on Sergei Skripal and his daughter Yulia in Salisbury.
Foreign Secretary Boris Johnson accused Russian President Vladimir Putin of personally ordering the poisoning of the Skripals, who remain hospitalised in critical condition after the March 4 attack.
Putin’s spokesman denounced the claim.
Meanwhile new tensions have surfaced over the death this week of a London-based Russian businessman, Nikolai Glushkov.
Brit cops said Friday that he died from compression to the neck and opened a murder investigation.
Russia also says it suspects foul play in Glushkov’s death and opened its own inquiry Friday.