they get you out of the rock at the back nobody gets past you we need you to get going let's go. alone because i want you and i really have to join the other two thousand and three in the world cup in russia meet the special one it was ok she needs to just say to redo the aussie team's latest edition to make up the big i need to look. below and welcome to cross talk or all things considered i'm peter lavelle it appears and highly likely these are the words used by u.k. prime minister to resume pinning blame on russia for the poison attack on

a former russian intelligence officer turned british claims are made and threats flaunted of course without evidence. crosstalk in the poison attack in britain i'm joined by my guest alexander macarius in london he is a writer on legal affairs as well as editor in chief of the duran dot com also in london we have charles shoe bridge he is a security analyst and a former u.k. army and counterterrorism intelligence officer and in brussels we cross to any much shown she is a former british intelligence officer and writer or across time pros in effect that means you can jump in anytime you want and i always appreciate alexander macarius i'd like to go to an article that you just recently wrote in the title is very telling to resume neta now demands russia provide prove itself innocence and that's a very curious form of jurisprudence isn't it isn't that backwards what she's

asking go ahead. well that is exactly what she's asking because she's asking that by a certain specified time rusher is supposed to say that to provide the evidence that will prove that it was not russian the russian state that did this thing now that completely reverses the burden of proof which is that some of it she is assumed to be innocent until they're proved guilty and it that it is the person who makes the accusation who is supposed to prove it and this is a complete reversal of a principle that has underpinned the whole net the whole direction of european jurisprudence since the middle ages but that's the kind of situation which way already. ok and it. seems to me with the prime minister's words but she's already for garment investigation because she already has a corporate i mean again it seems everything's upside down and by doing this like

we had in the case where you've already decided the guilty party and you won't go down different avenues to do actually real investigation and find out what happened this is a repeat that's the only thing that's similar with the. case before is it's been politicized instead of going through the nuts and bolts of doing detective work go ahead any absolutely and we saw this right when the story broke last week in the sense that the british media stampeded down this path but i have to give certain credit to the home secretary of the u.k. amber rug because she did say for many days we need to allow the police space to investigate this and identify the substance now in terms of investigation i've suggested three avenues they have to go down first of all the boots on the street getting eyewitness accounts c.c.t.v. footage that sort of thing secondly identifying the substance which they're now say they have done but thirdly and crucially finding out what this guy's been up to every last eight years since he was rinse clean by the russian service before he

was sent over pardoned and sent back to the u.k. and would have been written skin of intelligence by m i six once he arrived in the u.k. so i can't see a motive there but in terms of the substance as well yes sure if this nerve agent is what they say it is it might have been developed in russia thirty years ago but then you know plenty of nerve agents been developed by plenty of other countries as well including the us germany the u.k. so in this case to say it was developed in russia thirty years ago means that it must be in the russians that does it it is a bit like saying well porton down the u.k. scientific establishment secretly developed something called the x. another nerve agent in the one nine hundred fifty s. and that was used to assassinate kim. brother the north korean leader last year so you know you couldn't be to say well. developed this poison that assassinated this guy it's crazy but there seems to be very little critical analysis going on in the stampede to blame russia well they don't want to be critical analysis let me go to

charles here i mean it seems like the entire political establishment and the media in the u.k. are very happy with the words that it's russia's fault and now we have to wait for the consequences here i mean they're not even not even there's like the ultimatum is on both sides now the russians want to say well what is this stuff show it to us maybe we can help you identify it and then the ultimatum is that you have to admit your guilt on the british side here i mean the british side doesn't want any kind of resolution here they have already got what they wanted they have a narrative that you know russia is bad and we have to sanction it somehow in some form and maybe we could mention the world cup here in a second here go ahead charles. yes undoubtedly you can see from the comments of some politicians but especially out of the mainstream media here in the u.k. and to lesser extent elsewhere that there is an agenda driving this irrespective of what the facts that lay behind it since then i mean quite rightly recognized and

remember i speak as a former detective and investigator in matters similar to this in some ways. that motif is an important part of that it isn't everything but the and then the other evidence to see which way it points the evidence of the actually the actual physical evidence here such as been disclosed because a great amount of it of course hasn't been disclosed and perhaps hasn't yet been discovered isn't in any way conclusive in this case but when it comes to motive you know arguably there is a motive for russia to kill somebody that or to attempt to kill somebody who is seen as a traitor but in this particular case there is a much greater motive surely to avoid this kind of situation just weeks before before russian elections just before the world cup at a time when there is enough stress and problems between the west and east as it currently stands why russia would carry out this kind of attack particularly it would appear using

a method that anybody that used that method would surely know would point straight back to russia so we can say here i think somewhat conclusively at least at this stage that whatever the circumstances of the attack whoever carried out if they did use this nerve agent that's been described did it knowing that russia would almost certainly be blamed and then you forever therefore you have to ask the question would that be russia if alexander again glad that charles brought that up i mean why in the world just like in the case of linton enco you know use a means to try to kill someone that is so extraordinary that you know the possibilities of who could have done it is very much narrowed the charles pointed out this seems i'm sorry for me it looks like a. complete set up ok and the timing is perfect for people that want to. the push the narrative of worse relations well between russia and the west we are one more other thing charles the whole situation going on in the ukraine where it's usually are grossly unreported in the in the western media go ahead alexander yes i

mean there is very wide speculation not perhaps in the mainstream media but elsewhere that this is a kind of provocations of sort of a provocation intended to worsen relations even further between russia and of the west and to complicate the situation in advance of the world cup and the russian presidential elections are personally i'm going to resist the temptation to speculate along this these lines simply because we just don't know enough about this incident and i want to just also repeat a point that charles ridge made which i think is an entirely valid one i have not been an investigator but in my past life i have seen the results of many investigations and very often in fact more often than not the clue to a person's death is or or attack is in the person themselves in their background and

we need to know a norful lot more about this person and why he was attacked and why he was and chosen as an attack and to start pointing fingers at this very early stage is is frankly completely wrong. i would make one final point that this in response to all of this which is of course when ultimatums are made such as the one that to raise the may has made it is to mine mind a sign that the british government doesn't have the evidence the points to russia because if it did why he would eat. challenge the russians to prove their innocence in that kind of way you know any one of the things that's really interesting in this. he was part of this prisoner exchange by exchange and two thousand and ten presumably they could have pretty much squeezed everything out of the. british

intelligence i mean he kind of went to the u.k. is a blank sheet i would imagine you know what could you speculate that so it's kind of was your world at one time i mean what in the world after going through all that being a liberal russian prison for espionage for the british government i mean what the world could he possibly gotten themselves into that would warrant this kind of you know a murder attempt going here because i'm mystified. this is absolutely the key question in my view so we have a guy who was recruited and betrayed his country for ten years he worked as an agent for m i six and he handed over other agent names across europe reportedly and then he was caught he was tried he was convicted he was imprisoned and then he was pardoned by the russian state and allowed to be to go free to go to the u.k. as part of the two thousand and ten spy swap with a russian alleged legals which included anna chapman who went back to russia so of

course russia would have known exactly what he knew they would have put him through the mill in terms of getting any intelligence ask him and they would not have released him if they thought he was still a threat you know then of course when he arrived in the u.k. he would have been debriefed for weeks by m i six before allowed to go free and live a life and you know he lived his life quite openly so this is the key question and i've been saying this ever since the story broke what on earth was he involved in in the last eight years since he's been living in the u.k. who was he working with who were its contacts and that might give the investigators a clue to who might indeed have perpetrated this attack i don't think it's going to be a russian state retaliatory thing i just can't see the motivation and i don't either . you know charles i mean what i mean it's there's some speculation there's so many people that have their own theories i think that there's a page on the web site all the different conspiracies out there some people are making a connection to jonathan's christopher steele i mean does that make any sense to

you. now it doesn't first of all of course this was a long. piece i was chris to stay away from. any. knowledge of what's going on in the russian military or security establishment he wasn't really in a position to provide any of this kind of information and also i think i've read it may be true maybe not true but still himself so in talking to i think to the guardian which is not a lot of contact question to stay with us if example actually he wasn't involved in any way duction of that i'm going to jump in here we have to go to a hard break and after that short break we'll continue our discussion on british russian relations with art. in the heart of the swiss alps this is

a place probably more secretive than the pentagon more mysterious than the cia and . for. all the science is controlled by. the opening times. it is from the procedures in place of the strictest in all europe monster pieces by artists like picasso and modigliani i can't boards and sold inside this warehouse that's where the report comes in it covers a deals with naturally discreet commercially discreet but also discreet because they concern for. some of those paintings are linked to dark secrets. nobody knows how many of these secrets a kept inside the geneva freeport says physician that he will never obtain an inventory of all the works in the freeport who knows how many there are three hundred three thousand three hundred thousand is it a matter of confidentiality only is it the world's black box of the art business

join me every thursday on the alex salmond show and i'll be speaking to get off of the world of politics sports business i'm show business i'll see you then. welcome back across like where all things are considered i'm peter all about your money we're discussing u.k. russia relations. you know alexander one of the in particular things about the u.k. since the end of the soviet union is that a lot of ethnic russians with

a many of them with very dubious pasts and ways that beat their money and found their way into the u.k. when it's convenient they say there are political dissident i always like that little trick here. with their pockets all stuffed full of money but it's kind of turned into a kind of morbid playground of settling scores that have you know have some kind of connection with russia in the case that we're talking about right now that it looks like it was a purely british affair i mean you know don't think that you know isn't there any kind of reflection in the u.k. that maybe you shouldn't let these crooked billionaires into the u.k. i know they've got a lot of money and money does talk go ahead alexander what is so strange about this is yes the reason if there is some reflection about this there are people who are saying we've allowed all sorts of very. well from russia to wrong here but in all coming to twist the blame for that is actually being directed at russia. of all of these very strange people that you're talking about

are somehow connected to the russian authorities whereas as you and peter peter and i both know they're not all most of these people are antagonistic to the russian authorities and of course they have their own quarrels and that's why. they've come to london to get out of the reach of the russian authorities and they're bringing their problems to groups and we've seen the results so if the british really do take action to stop these people coming to grips it's not going to it's not going to. the russians the russians will be pleased about it this is again part of the upside down world that we were talking about before you know in any way what do what does the government want i mean obviously russia has and

given any kind of evidence about this case forensic evidence i mean what in the world would be expect the russians to do and what do you think the sanction will be afterwards because you know. she's at a political mess right now. she doesn't have a memorable time in office here she's found this one issue she's really pushing it here i mean coming to conclusions before facts are presented not ever to the public by the way here i mean you know what is you know is this an internal domestic issue for her i mean she's found this one issue the kind of booster a little bit because she needs a whole lot of boosting go ahead and. well i think as you say she's in a very weak political position. and she will be under pressure from l i six because bear in mind this guy worked as an agent to m i six for a decade and was handed back to them they had a duty of protection to their source and they seem to fumbled it and allowed him to be attacked in the u.k. by persons unknown but again in terms of the political aspects and also the

scientific aspects we need to get the forensics around the chemicals that were used allegedly used so just to make statements in parliament which are quite bellicose is reckless at this point and she did say well it could have been the russian state or it could have been they didn't take enough. they're securing their nerve agents so it's their fault anyway but bear in mind there is you know other there are other cases from history that other countries have done the same thing so for example go back to two thousand and one in the immediate aftermath of nine eleven there was a number of cases of militarized anthrax being sent through the post to politicians and news editors across the u.k. five people died seventeen people were injured and therefore saying oh you know it must be an outside source it turned out after years investigation it was some rogue agent allegedly coming out of the laboratory itself so you know even the usa

can't secure its biological and weapons of mass of mass destruction so immediately say it must be the russian state because they developed this thirty years ago even though lots of other people have the recipe they must have been slacking in protecting is i think is disingenuous at best and potentially hugely damaging for diplomatic relationships and world peace at worst you know charles you know i was been made aware that i think it was in one thousand nine hundred two or a lot of these chemical agents they were revealed to the public so hard you certainly you need the facilities to make it but the recipe the roadmap is there what it it's all about what kind of compounds and all that so that kind of adds to the wrinkle but charles what do you what do you think that you know what does to resume really want i mean does she want to ratchet up this confrontation with russia and it to what degree i mean there are so many fronts now or there is tension and so you know it's one of these games of chicken and i can tell you and i

make a very clear to our viewers here the russian states not going to blink just get used to it there's plenty of cases we can see that around the world go ahead charles yes one wonders the extent to which in so many matters in fact and this is a good example of the extent to which to reason and even her government ministers are actually driving. this situation or whether they're being driven by it and if they're being driven by it they're being driven by other actors behind the scenes perhaps even those that may have been involved in some degree and who could benefit from it unlike russia which doesn't seem to be getting any benefit from this action whatsoever where you raised the subject of oligarchy not just from russia from ukraine and elsewhere in the world or unsavory in many cases in london we ask the question why they're allowed to settle or one needs to look. at the donations to political parties in this country in the united kingdom labor for example the opposition parties today recently challenge to. the government to stop taking

donations from russian exile oligarchy to political terms of political donations to the conservative party that's been declined so these people where would political power that is well beyond there should we say representative basis and so that may be a reason why they're untouchable here but let's look at this not be chocked that this alleged chemical agent it's been used i've just read very recently an one thousand nine hundred nine article in the new york times no less not a pro russian organ organ whatsoever describing in one thousand nine hundred nine the united states' efforts to help clear up. the production plant or testing plants involving allegedly this chemical agent novacek this is in one thousand nine hundred nine you know it's not in russia it's in his backyard stan and so we can see that this agent is likely to be not just produced by russia but elsewhere as well and furthermore of course it seems to be that certainly the political consensus amongst many of the actual chemists not the so-called experts from

organizations such as ballin cat and others that are then we would out by the media in these circumstances because they know their coverage will be pro-u.s. u.k. in every instance but real chemists are saying that with the one consensus seems to be that even if it's not particularly easy to make the ingredients for making this alleged chemical agent. very very easy to come by and so therefore it's conceivable that anybody with some training at least anywhere in the world could have made this unless we have more evidence and we haven't got that evidence to pin it on russia as yet you know alexander reading your article that i mentioned at the beginning of the program and you gave you elaborate on the case of lindh linfen yank oh and. the results of the investigation way after the political storm and at its impact here and they found that they couldn't determine where it came from in a number of issues here but the storm had already passed ok the impression had

already been made and now you know it was the putin did it ok that was that they're looking for that moment right now i surmise probably this is going to happen again but it will be far from the public view it will be like an appendix in history go ahead. that is the safe will danger of prejudging something before all the facts are there and that is exactly what happened in the case the whole assumption at the outset that the russian state was involved in the litvinenko case was that polonium was very expensive was only produced in russia and could be traced there when the inquiry that was convened to learned through none of it terrorists looked at that and. none of it was true none of it was true but by that point as you rightly say it was far too late because the idea that the russians the russians were involved had already become fixed and there was nothing really stickley by

that point that was going to change it and the result was again as andy and charles has said a lot of other possible lines of inquiry were not followed up you know any one of the things that should be concerning us all is that the different layers of sanctions that the u.s. has put on in the european union. i mean there's a separation between the west and russia further and further apart and you know i surmise that and i hear this in circles here in moscow is that who who cares why do we want a relationship with these people they all seem pathological ok i mean it was only a few hours ago the house intel committee came out and said well after eighteen months. no collusion ok and now we get the story in the u.k. it's like passing the baton let's keep it going the russian side is just exhausted by all of this you're inventing things lying exaggerating the media the media is so

compliant it's click bait for them they don't have to think they don't have any sense of morality you know this this is a this is that the chasm of trust or a lack of trust between the two and that's worrisome go ahead amie no i totally agree i mean we have a situation where over the last few years because of the west's determination not to try and resolve diplomatic issues with russia russia has pivoted towards the east you know all these new trade deals with china all these new transport lines pipelines all the rest of it are huge for russia and huge for china that is not being reported in the west alternatively what you get is someone like me who talks about this and i was on. the night the story broke two hours later i was on b.b.c. news night the night the story broke and i said exactly the same points and yet on the one hand putin's useful idiot or a stooge on the other hand praise from the newsnight formants and that duality is

actually quite stark when you're living through it and i think that's what we're seeing at the moment with the western media is dangerous because exacerbate diplomatic relations between the west and russia and you know i i hope that we can dial down these accusations and come to some sort of diplomatic understanding proper forensic and investigation and that we can step away from the brink which is what i think we're beginning to look at you know that it's very interesting all of you bring a very rational points in and ways to resolve this or try to understand it but unfortunately politicians in the media they don't like it that way that's all the dime we have many thanks to my guests in london and in brussels and thanks to our viewers for watching us here at our to you see you next time and remember crosstalk rules.

this baby and. this one much eighteen some votes with your remote. for special coverage of the russian presidential election exit polls opinions real time results monitoring. the knot winds up. enough winds up to let down what might have been a tough the big finish. one seeking of a new south. taken in equal city. then yes what you're doing. now is that time. would be what. did you know well yeah such as our. next guest feeling if one means a leftist that he never let on to face them tokio find it is going to have to go.

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the u.k.'s prime minister expounds twenty three russian diplomats from britain in retaliation for the kremlin's alleged involvement in the poisoning of a former russian intelligence agent and his daughter despite police having declared no birthday this week is no alternative conclusion other than that the russian state was culpable for the attempted murder of mr script and his daughter under the vienna convention the united kingdom will now expel twenty three russian diplomats who have been identified as undeclared intelligence officers. russian react to britain's measures calling them unacceptable and unjustified promising i retaliate or a response.