Pull The Other One . . .

What's With Winston and Russia?

In New Zealand we have a senior politician--the Deputy Prime Minister in fact--who seems to have a deep attachment to Russia.  No-one is quite sure why the attachment exists, but in his role as Foreign Minister, Winston Peters endeavours to put a positive gloss on anything and everything the Russian state does.  It is puzzling.

When Russia was publicly accused of using two professional spies from its secretive GRU to attempt to assassinate two Russians in the UK, Peters played it down.  As the evidence mounted he reluctantly "got on board" with the rest of the human race and agreed that it was a bad look for Russia.  This was one horse Peters ought never to have backed.

The two GRU agents had since returned to Russia and gone to ground.  But when the formal accusations and indictments came forth from the UK, the hapless duo were paraded on Russian state TV for an interview in which they claimed they had merely been tourists in the UK.

The Daily Mail has shot holes in their clumsy story.

Suspected Russian assassins in Sergei Skripal saga ridiculed after claiming to have been tourists

Two Russian men have been charged over the Salisbury poisonings. According to UK Prime Minister Theresa May, both men are officers of Russian President Vladimir Putin's military spy agency.  The men, claiming to be Ruslan Boshirov and Alexander Petrov, claimed to be desperate to see the Salisbury Cathedral's magnificent "123-metre spire" and visited the city twice in three days, the Daily Mail reported.

But bizarrely they stayed 127 miles away in an east London hotel even though they insisted they were in Britain to visit its "famous cathedral" and took no pictures.  . . . . The men told Kremlin-funded state broadcaster Russia Today yesterday they had been on a two-day holiday to Salisbury.

But these ten glaring flaws blow a huge hole in their version of events.

1. What about the Novichok found in hotel room?The most glaring problem with their story is the fact that traces of [nerve agent] novichok were found in their hotel room in East London. They were not asked, and did not explain, how this could possibly be the case.

2. Why stay in East London anyway?The pair say they flew from Moscow to visit Salisbury insisting: "Our friends have been suggesting for quite a long time that we visit this wonderful city." But if they had truly wanted to experience the Wiltshire gem, why not stay in one of more than 60 hotels and guesthouses in the city? Instead, they wasted hours going back and forth on trains.

3. Their complaints about the snowy weatherRuslan Boshirov claimed: "It was impossible to get anywhere because of the snow. We were drenched up to our knees." And his accomplice complained that on their Sunday visit, "there was heavy rain with snow". Salisbury had indeed been transformed into a stunning winter wonderland with a blanket of snow in the days before they arrived. But the temperatures were already easing on Saturday March 3, the first day they visited. By Sunday it was a relatively balmy 9C and occasionally sunny. There were no reports of "heavy rain". CCTV images of the pair on Sunday showed it was damp but there was not a snowflake in sight. And a photo taken of Salisbury Cathedral on March 3 shows the snow had already melted from its roof.

4. Wrong direction for visiting cathedralBoshirov and Petrov insist they wanted to witness the magnificent spire of Salisbury Cathedral. This can be seen from the railway station – yet CCTV shows how the two Russians set off in completely the opposite direction. Instead of heading south-east from the station to the cathedral, they walked north-west and were captured on CCTV walking past a Shell garage on the way to the Skripal family home.

5. No pictures of them visiting cathedralThe unlikely sightseers were spotted in many places in Salisbury – yet not at the cathedral, despite it being the city's main attraction. They claim to have been there on the Sunday, saying: "The cathedral is very beautiful. They have lots of tourists, lots of Russian tourists." If CCTV exists of them visiting the 800-year-old treasure, it has not been made public.
The two men do claim to have their own snaps of their visit however, but have failed to release them. The pair also claim they also "went to a park, we had some coffee. We went to a coffee shop and drank coffee". So far, no CCTV has been released to back this up.
The claim by two suspects in the Skripal case that they visited Salisbury to see its cathedral "doesn't seem to add up", the Wiltshire city's bishop has said. . . .

6. Bus tours to Stonehenge were not cancelledPetrov said the pair had also wanted to see nearby Stonehenge on Salisbury Plain, "but it didn't work out because of the slush". Visitors to the prehistoric monument, nine miles north of Salisbury, can catch a bus directly from the station forecourt. . . . Asked if snow or anything else had affected services, a spokesman for bus operator Salisbury Reds told the Mail yesterday: "The tour buses ran as normal on Sunday 4 March."

7. Airport entry photoBoshirov suggests CCTV photos of them walking through Gatwick arrivals must have been faked, because they appear to show the two men walking through the same customs channel with precisely the same timestamp. But British police have already explained that there are two parallel channels.

8. 'Fake photos' proved realThe pair's confessions they were indeed the men in the photos wrecks one of Russia's favourite conspiracy theories – that the British authorities faked the images.

9. Bad timingA major flaw in their account was the very fact that the Skripals were indeed poisoned on the day they visited Salisbury.

10. Two return flights and the missing luggageThe pair also failed to explain why they had booked two alternative return flights from London to Moscow – giving them the option of fleeing on Sunday or Monday. The men went straight from Salisbury to Heathrow for the evening flight. But CCTV suggested that they did not have any luggage with them on their way home.

The two Kremlin assassins were widely ridiculed yesterday after claiming to have been ordinary tourists desperate to see the Salisbury Cathedral's magnificent "123-metre spire".  The burly pair admitted they were in the city on the day Sergei Skripal was poisoned, but insisted they only went to visit its "famous cathedral" and nearby Stonehenge.

Their unlikely story was branded "lies and blatant fabrication" by Theresa May last night, who said it "insulted the public's intelligence" and was deeply offensive to the victims of the chemical attack. Foreign Secretary Jeremy Hunt added: "The last time Russian military claimed to be on holiday was when they invaded Ukraine in 2014."

Well, not all is lost.  It seems as if Russia may have one loyal non-Russian believer in the story.  Our Deputy PM/Foreign Affairs Minister might rise to the defence of Vladimir Putin's "tourists" given half a chance.

What a strange man our most senior member of the New Zealand government is turning out to be.