It was Sweden who adopted the formula for Novichok – a truth to hard to tell?

Three articles about the swedish Novichok-affair that was published at the site Retrogradera have lead to no response in swedish media. In Sweden still noone in news media wants to deal with the swedish involvement with Novichok. Six months later and the Novichok story has been used for sanctions on  Russia with still no proof being presented of its guilt in the Skripal case.

It was Sweden who adopted the formula for Novichok

May 16, 2018

German media today report that Sweden was commissioned by the German security service BND to analyze a sample of Novichok  from Russia in the 1990s.

German Der Spiegel writes in a comment to the information that the West has had Novichok since the late 90’s: ”The new details leave many questions unanswered. After the attack on Skripals in Great Britain. The western world had specifically accused Russia. Moscow must have poisoned the former KGB man, that was the line, because only Russia had acces to devolp Novichok . The proof that Russia in reality is guilty is  in fact missing or kept secret by Western governments. ”

Behind these sensational discoveries that the West and Germany have had access to Novichock since the 1990s were Süddeutsche Zeitung, NDR, WDR and Die Zeit in  a joint cooperation. However, the news has still not reached other Western media at 22 09  2018-05-16. On BBC, at The Guardian, and on SVT and SR there is silence  even though a cable  in English was sent by Reuters over two hours ago.

Novichok in the sleeping couch. Swedish secret  agents smuggled Novichok on Swedish train

In Friday’s release of Der Spiegel, 25/2018, the weekly magazine it is  said  Swedish secret agents smuggled a nerve posion on Swedish regular train up to the defense plant in Norrland in the late 90’s. The operation was a cooperation between the German and Swedish security services and anchored in the German government and probably also in the Swedish Government. Der Spiegel writes that Swedish authorities had been upset that the secret nerve agent was transported on a civil train in regular traffic.

Retrogardera has previously pointed out that Sweden was the country that, in the 1990s, analyzed the formula for Novichok with the help of a sample that was smuggled out of Russia by a Russian defector scientist. The chemical formula found by swedish scientists was then handed over to a number of NATO countries.

To date, no Swedish media agency has told about the matter and an opion piece from Retrogradera’s editor-in-chief was rejected in SVT opinion without comment. Nor did Aftonbladet or ETC show any interest in raising the issue. Now it is a month since the world news spread that the West has had access to Novichok since 90’s and that it was Sweden who analyzed the formula for the preparation for a number of western countries. In Friday’s Der Spiegel, further compromising information is presented to the Swedish state power, NATO, the British government and all those who invested capital in spreading the official Western narrative about the Skripal case. This time someone in Sweden has to ask the question or will the silence again prevail?

Der Spiegel tells that on June 31, 1997, the wife of a Russian defector went to see her relatives in Halland. On her she has a sample of Novichok. She takes a ferry and  on Swedish soil she is accompanied by Swedish Säpo[security police] who will shield off any Russian agents that might know of the operation.

Göran Olofsson, a Swedish chemical warfare expert, remembers that the Novichok sample was smuggled in a chocolate box fitted with aluminum packaging and activated carbon charcoal for protection in case of leakage. The day after the Novichok tube arrived in Sweden, two SÄPO-agents travelled the long distance of 1000 kilometers up to a defense facility in northern Sweden where the preparation was analyzed. According to Der Spiegel, Swedish authorities had been  upset about the transport of the nerve agent on  a regular passenger train. However, the German security service was so pleased with their bargain that they even was leaking disinformation about it to the media. Süddeutsche Zeitung wrote in March 1997 that the defector scientist was in the west in a safe place and had provided information about ”a whole new type of nerve gas”

Today, nobody at German government level wants to speak about  the Germany’s operations in the 90’s or answer the question of which NATO countries have had access to the Novichok. Der Spiegel writes that one can not persuade anyone with  repeating the same phrases over and over again  [Russia did it end of line] or to duck  when questioned, but yet the German government is doing exactly that.

In the German parliament, the Deputy Speaker of the Left Party Sevim Dağdel recently asked the question of what the German government knew about the secret operation in Sweden and about the existence of Novichok in different NATO countries. To  these questions, he received no answers. The case  would jeopardize the security of the country it is said and Foreign Minister Heiko Maas refers without further explanation that ”Facts and Indications Point to Russia”

Der Spiegel writes that Britain has suffered from having so heavily accusated Russia without being able to show evidence supporting its argument. Contrary to what has been argued, not only Novichok has been produced only in Russia but in several Western countries. Contrary to what has been argued, Putin has not threatened to kill the double agent Skripal. After more than three months after Skripal was found unconscious on a park bench, no credible evidence has been submitted for Russia to be guilty of poisoning Skripal. The fact that Russia and Putin would have issued a hunt on the double agent Skripal is not covered and it is not the first time that West has failed in this case. Immediately after the assault, the British Foreign Minister said that the poison had come from Russia, the head of Porton Down, the UK nuclear weapons research center, would have told him. This was promptly denied by the same boss.

And recently, both Skripal have recovered from their coma surprisingly fast, according to hospital spokesperson, wrote  Klaus Wiegrefe for the  Spiegel in Friday’s number 25/2018

Swedish tabloid Expressen wrote about swedish Novichok opertaion as early as 2001

On May 15 this year, an investigative team of journalists from Germany’s leading elite media at the Süddeutsche Zeitung, Die Zeit, WDR and NDR revealed that Sweden in the 90’s received a sample with Novichok from a defected Russian scientist via the German intelligence service. The German government and the German security service then refused to comment on the investigation team’s tasks, which, however, spread throughout the world’s media through Reuters into the New York Times to India and China and the rest of the world’s corners. The hilarious thing was that in the country that should have been the active party in the western  Novichok operation, Sweden, not a single media agency did not publish this sensational news except Retrogradera. The silence was amazing. [here is the source of Zeit: BND beschaffte Nowitschok aus russischem Labor 16.6-2018]

With the knowledge of the German Government Offices and the Ministry of Defense, a sample of Novichok was analyzed in Sweden and only the formula presented by the Swedes was returned to the German Security Service and the Ministry of Defense. Where the original Novichok sample has taken the road is unclear. On Helmut Kohl’s advice, the German security service would share the knowledge of Novichok with its closest partners, the United States and the United Kingdom, and a group of five NATO countries should have collaborated around Novichok and small quantities of poison should also have been produced in individual countries.

The Swedish government was questioned about the Novichok operation by the investigating team from Germany’s media. According to Deutsche Welle, the Swedish government said that it had not known the information and that it needed more time to answer the question. Since then, it has elapsed two months and on August 22, a week ago, we are told via Die Welt that the newspaper’s investigative department has also asked questions to the German Government about the joint German-Swedish campaign but only received the answer that everything is secret. The newspaper has attached the government’s response document in the article. It also appears that Expressen already wrote in 2001 about the Swedish campaign. A search in the media archive shows that this is true and also sensational. The Swedish government answered in mid-June that it knew nothing about the Swedish operation. Perhaps someone in the government should be able to search the Media Archive? In the Expressen article, Swedish researchers who participated in the operation were named. People on Säpö  itself should  have reacted to the danger to the public when the nerve was transported on regular Swedish regular trains and wrote a complaint about it.

German media cooperation revealed the story

In an article in Der Spiegel June 16 entitled ”Novichok in the Sleeping couch”, Spiegel tells in an extended version of the Expressen article from 2001 the story of the German-Swedish secret Novichok operation. It seems that the newspaper has again talked with the researchers named in the Expressenartikeln 2001. . A newspaper in Augsburg drew attention to it but this time there were no echoes in other western media. Retrogradera has previously written about the article and put attention to how Spiegel claims that the Western narrative have fallen apart and that the West has no evidence of their claims that Russia is behind the poisoning of the double agent Skripal and his daughter.

The Novichok follow-up story has since been given new chapters, and the United States has, with reference to the Skripal case, issued new comprehensive sanctions against Russia, but no evidence has been added. In the UK there is a skepticism about the issue that has been noted in a number of articles about how people around Salisbury look at the matter. Individual western intellectuals like Craig Murray, John Pilger and later Seymour Hersh and Simon Jenkins in the Guardian have expressed their strong skepticism about the official Western accusations against Russia. In Sweden, however, the population is unaware that Expressen wrote about Sweden’s involvement with Novichok in 2001.  This is crucial because the most important building block of the official narrative was that only the Russians have known and been able to produce Novichok. When Sweden had known Novichok since 1997 and provided a series of western countries with it, then the entire official story falls.