The British are leading the charge with a newly concocted international campaign to accuse Russia of using chemical weapons in Mariupol, Ukraine – without bothering to produce one shred of evidence to back up the accusation, as they had perfected with the Skripal poisoning lies in 2018.
First, Kyiv’s neo-Nazi Azov Regiment issued a Telegram message earlier this week reporting that the Russians had used “a poisonous substance of unknown origin.” They posted a video of their soldiers doubled over, coughing and wheezing. A former correspondent for the BBC’s Ukraine service, current Rada Deputy Ivanna Klympush, then tweeted: “This morning #Russians threatened to use ‘chemical troops’ against Mariupol’s defenders. Now #Azov reports #RU did it.” Next, Ukraine’s Deputy Defense Minister Hanna Malyar, as reported by Ukrinform, amplified the message on national TV, asserting that “we need to understand that the risk of using chemical weapons does exist, it is quite high.”
Enter British Foreign Secretary Liz Truss, who aggressively tweeted: “Any use of such weapons would be a callous escalation in this conflict, and we will hold Putin and his regime to account.” British Armed Forces Minister James Heappey told Sky News that, although there had been no verification of the reports, “Let’s be clear, if they are used at all then President Putin should know that all possible options are on the table in terms of how the West might respond.”
After that, Pentagon spokesman John Kirby said: “We cannot confirm the reports that were out on social media yesterday that chemical agents were used in Mariupol,” but “we know that the Russians have a history of using chemical agents. And they have shown a propensity in the past, and so we’re taking it seriously.” The State Department’s ever-imaginative spokesman Ned Price added that “Russia may seek to resort to chemical weapons” and try to blame it on the U.S., since “we know that Russia has a track record. Russia has used these agents against its own people on Russian soil, on European soil.”
