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Yulia
Skripal issues statement via British police, asks cousin not to
contact her
RT,
11
April, 2018
Yulia
Skripal has refused contact with the Russian Embassy and her
Moscow-based cousin, Viktoria, and asked for no one else to speak on
her behalf, in a statement released by Scotland Yard after she was
discharged from hospital.
Despite
leaving Salisbury hospital on Monday, Skripal said that she is “still
suffering with the effects of the nerve agent used against us,”
adding that her father, former double agent Sergei, remains
“seriously ill.”
"I
find myself in a totally different life than the ordinary one I left
just over a month ago, and I am seeking to come to terms with my
prospects, whilst also recovering from this attack on me,” the
statement said.
Skripal,
a Russian citizen, said that she has been given contacts at the
Russian Embassy in the UK, but said that at “the moment I do not
wish to avail myself of their services,” adding that “if I change
my mind I know how to contact them.”
Statement issued on behalf of Yulia Skripal who continues to receive police support following her release from hospital news.met.police.uk/news/statement…
Explaining
that she is “not strong enough to give a full interview to the
media,” Skripal insisted “that no one speaks for me, or for my
father, but ourselves.” She specifically asked her cousin,
Viktoria, who has appeared extensively on Russian television and
requested to see Yulia through diplomatic channels, “not to visit
me or try to contact me,” underlining that “her opinions and
assertions are not mine and they are not my father's.”
Viktoria
told Ruptly last week that Yulia sounded “coached” and “did not
use her own words” during the only phone conversation between the
relatives. Despite Yulia saying she was not open to a visit on the
phone line, Viktoria insisted that it would overcome “bureaucratic
tricks” that led to her visitor visa application to the UK being
denied, and she personally appealed to Theresa May to overturn the
decision.
READ
MORE: ‘Not her own words’: Skripal relative describes weird phone
call, asks PM May for UK visa
Hours
earlier, a Russian Embassy source in London accused UK authorities of
“forcibly detaining” Yulia and her father and said that Moscow
diplomats would continue to try to arrange a meeting with her.
What @thetimes actually reveals is that Yulia Skripal is held hostage by the same people who destroy evidence and fail to come up with a single official account of the crime.
“The
UK side continues to deny us information about her true health
status, wishes or location,” the source told RIA news agency. “It
is apparent that she is being isolated, eyewitness evidence is being
concealed, and obstacles are being erected in the path of an
objective and independent investigation.”
Skripal
and her father fell into a coma for several weeks, following what
appeared to be a poisoning on March 4 in the city of Salisbury, where
Sergei lived after being exchanged in a spy swap in 2010.
The
UK insists that Russia was behind the attack, a claim the Kremlin has
staunchly denied. Britain and its allies have expelled over 100
Russian diplomats over the incident, with mirror measures being
applied by Moscow.
Yulia
Skripal Is Plainly Under Duress
11
April, 2018
Only
the Russians have allowed us to hear the actual voice of Yulia
Skripal, in that recorded conversation with her cousin. So the one
thing we know for certain is that, at the very first opportunity she
had, she called back to her cousin in Russia to let her know what is
going on. If you can recall, until the Russians released that phone
call, the British authorities were still telling lies that Sergei was
in a coma and Yulia herself in a serious condition.
We
do not know how Yulia got to make the call. Having myself been
admitted unconscious to hospital on several occasions, each time when
I came to I found my mobile phone in my bedside cabinet. Yulia’s
mobile phone plainly had been removed from her and not returned. Nor
had she been given an official one – she specifically told her
cousin that she could not call her back on that phone as she had it
temporarily. The British government could have given her one to keep
on which she could be called back, had they wished to help her.
The
most probable explanation is that Yulia persuaded somebody else in
the hospital to lend her a phone, without British officials
realising. That would explain why the first instinct of the British
state and its lackey media was to doubt the authenticity of the call.
It would explain why she was able to contradict the official
narrative on their health, and why she couldn’t get a return call.
It would, more importantly, explain why her family has not been able
to hear her voice since. Nor has anybody else.
It
strikes me as inherently improbable that, when Yulia called her
cousin as her first act the very moment she was able, she would now
issue a formal statement through Scotland Yard forbidding her cousin
to be in touch or visit. I simply do not believe this British Police
statement:
“I was discharged from Salisbury District Hospital on the 9th April 2018. I was treated there with obvious clinical expertise and with such kindness, that I have found I missed the staff immediately.
“I have left my father in their care, and he is still seriously ill. I too am still suffering with the effects of the nerve agent used against us.
“I find myself in a totally different life than the ordinary one I left just over a month ago, and I am seeking to come to terms with my prospects, whilst also recovering from this attack on me.
“I have specially trained officers available to me, who are helping to take care of me and to explain the investigative processes that are being undertaken. I have access to friends and family, and I have been made aware of my specific contacts at the Russian Embassy who have kindly offered me their assistance in any way they can. At the moment I do not wish to avail myself of their services, but, if I change my mind I know how to contact them.
“Most importantly, I am safe and feeling better as time goes by, but I am not yet strong enough to give a full interview to the media, as I one day hope to do. Until that time, I want to stress that no one speaks for me, or for my father, but ourselves. I thank my cousin Viktoria for her concern for us, but ask that she does not visit me or try to contact me for the time being. Her opinions and assertions are not mine and they are not my father’s.
“For the moment I do not wish to speak to the press or the media, and ask for their understanding and patience whilst I try to come to terms with my current situation.”
There
is also the very serious question of the language it is written in.
Yulia Skripal lived part of her childhood in the UK and speaks good
English. But the above statement is in a particular type of formal,
official English of a high level which only comes from a certain kind
of native speaker.
“At
the moment I do not wish to avail myself of their services” –
wrote no native Russian speaker, ever.
Nor
are the rhythms or idioms such as would in any way indicate a
translation from Russian. Take “I thank my cousin Viktoria for her
concern for us, but ask that she does not visit me or try to contact
me for the time being. Her opinions and assertions are not mine and
they are not my father’s.” Not only is this incredibly cold given
her first impulse was to phone her cousin, the language is just
wrong. It is not the English Yulia would write and it is awkward to
translate into Russian, thus not a natural translation from it.
To
put it plainly, as someone who has much experience of it, the English
of the statement is precisely the English of an official in the UK
security services and precisely not the English of somebody like
Yulia Skripal or of a natural translation from Russian.
Yulia
is, of course, in protective custody “for her own safety”. At the
very best, she is being psychologically force-fed the story about the
evil Russian government attempting to poison her with the doorknob,
and she is being kept totally isolated from any influence that may
reinforce any doubts she feels as to that story. There are much worse
alternatives involving threat or the safety of her father. But even
at the most benevolent reading of the British authorities’ actions,
Yulia Skripal is being kept incommunicado, and under duress.
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