Attack reminiscent of KGB hit

Given Russia’s notorious reputation for assassinating dissidents at home and abroad, it is no surprise that Vladimir Putin’s regime is firmly in the frame for the sinister attack on a former Russian spy and his daughter in Wiltshire, England. Sergei Skripal, 66, a one-time Russian military intelligence colonel who spied for Britain’s MI6, and his daughter Yulia, 33, are fighting for their lives after being found unconscious on a shopping mall bench in Salisbury.

If the fate of another anti-Putin dissident, Alexander Litvinenko, is any indication they face slow, painful deaths: he took three weeks to die after his tea was poisoned by Russian agents in London in 2006. The substance that poisoned Mr Skripal and his daughter was so toxic that 10 emergency service workers and bystanders who helped were affected.

Mr Skripal was freed from a Russian jail in 2010 and went to Britain in a prisoner swap. At the time Mr Putin reportedly said: “Traitors will kick the bucket. Trust me.”

Under Mr Putin, Russia has become a rogue state, finetuning the poisoning of dissidents. British intelligence says the UK, favoured by the expatriate Russian community, has been the target for at least 14 such attacks. Mr Putin, a former Soviet KGB colonel, clearly has no compunction about using poison. He also is closely allied to the terrorist Assad regime and Iran in the Syrian civil war where chemical weapons are being used mercilessly against civilians. Other unexplained deaths such as that of outspoken anti-Putin oligarch Boris Berezovsky, found hanging in his UK home in 2013, also remain surrounded by deep suspicion.

British Foreign Secretary Boris Johnson has vowed a “robust” response if Russian involvement is confirmed in the Skripal attack. A global strategy is needed to isolate the Kremlin as a perpetrator of state terrorism.