Salisbury Incident

Lord Adonis Excerpts

Wednesday 14th March 2018 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Evans of Bowes Park]

I thank my noble friend, and I am sure this is something that is on the minds of my colleagues.

[Lord Adonis (Lab)]

My Lords, has the Leader of the House seen the statement that the Russian embassy has put out in response to the Prime Minister’s Statement this afternoon, and the statement by the Russian Ministry of Foreign Affairs? It says:

“Theresa May in Parliament on measures to ‘punish’ Russia constitutes an unprecedented, flagrant provocation that undermines the foundations of normal dialogue between our countries”.


The embassy has added, for good measure:

“We believe it is absolutely unacceptable and unworthy of the British Government to seek to further seriously aggravate relations in pursuit of its unseemly political ends”.


Do those two statements not completely sum up the attitude of the Russian Government, who are in flagrant defiance, so far as one can see, of international law and good bilateral practice—with not a word of regret or apology for the events that have taken place on the streets of Salisbury, which amount to attempted murder by one state against the citizens of another state? The noble Baroness says that we have suspended high-level contacts with the Russian Government. Can she say why the Russian ambassador has not been asked to leave the country in the light of these statements put out in his name by the Russian embassy?

[Baroness Evans of Bowes Park]

I entirely agree with the sentiments expressed by the noble Lord. As I said in a previous answer, we believe that this presents a robust and proportionate diplomatic response to the unlawful use of force against the UK by the Russian Federation. We thought it right to give the Russian Federation the chance to answer some significant questions that we put to them. It has failed to do so: therefore we have taken action—and we stand ready to take further action if that is proved to be necessary.