A public inquiry has found that Russian President Vladimir Putin bears “moral responsibility” for the death of a British woman in a nerve agent attack in the English city of Salisbury in March 2018, with the UK government responding by sanctioning the Russian intelligence agency (GRU) accused of carrying it out.

Speaking on Thursday after the inquiry’s findings were published, its chair, Anthony Hughes, a former senior judge, said Putin had “authorised the mission” to assassinate the former Russian spy Sergei Skripal .

The conduct of the Russian leader and the alleged GRU agents who planted the poison was “astonishingly reckless,” Hughes added.

The Kremlin continues to deny its involvement in the incident.

Skripal, a former GRU officer imprisoned in Russia for spying for the United

See Full Page