Russian ambassador slams ‘disgraceful’ Australian press for calling him a ‘Bond villain’

  • Russia’s ambassador to Australia Grigory Logvinov lashed out at the local media
  • He’s incensed at being asked about the poisoning of double agent Sergei Skripal
  • Canberra-based diplomat is upset journalists compared him to a Bond villain  

Russia’s ambassador says the Australian media did a ‘disgraceful’ job covering the expulsion of two Russian spies in Canberra over the Skripal poisoning in the UK.

Grigory Logvinov spent almost an hour last week talking to reporters in Canberra, denying Russia was involved with the nerve agent attack on former double agent Sergei Skripal and his daughter Yulia in Salisbury in Wiltshire.

Moscow’s man in Canberra has lashed out at reporters who he says humiliated themselves by asking him about the poisoning, which was the first chemical weapons attack in Britain since World War II.

 

Russia’s ambassador says Australia’s media did a ‘disgraceful’ job covering the expulsion of two Russian spies in Canberra over the Skripal poisoning in the UK

‘There is no real evidence of the Russian involvement in poisoning of the Skripals,’ Mr Logvinov said in a statement on Tuesday.

‘It was verified once again during the press conference, when the journalists put forward just repetitions of the unfounded accusations and personal attacks (first of all, humiliating for themselves) against all my reasonable arguments.’

The ambassador was unhappy as being described as ‘increasingly Soviet-Red in complexion’, a ‘Bond villain meets Lowes catalogue’, and the description of Russians as famously blunt.

‘In the ‘wild’ Russia, such statements would trigger criminal prosecution as the deliberate incitement of discord between different ethnic groups,’ Mr Logvinov’s statement said.

The two Canberra-based diplomats have left Australia, while Russia has expelled two Australian diplomats in return.

Britain has expelled 23 Russians, the US 60 and France and Germany four.

Grigory Logvinov spent almost an hour last week talking to reporters in Canberra, denying Russia had poisoned former double agent Sergei Skripal and his daughter Yulia in Salisbury

Grigory Logvinov spent almost an hour last week talking to reporters in Canberra, denying Russia had poisoned former double agent Sergei Skripal and his daughter Yulia in Salisbury

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