Yakovenko dismissed claims that the two chief suspects in the attempted murder of former Russian double agent Sergei Skripal were state intelligence officers operating under aliases.
And at a press conference at his official residence in London, Yakovenko said there was no reason to disbelieve their claims to be simple tourists.
The British investigative group Bellingcat has published what it says are the real identities of both suspects in the poisoning of Skripal and his daughter in the British city of Salisbury in March.
After scouring open-source material, it identified the men as officials in the GRU Russian military intelligence agency and gave their real names as Alexander Mishkin and Anatoly Chepiga.
The men claim they are Ruslan Boshirov and Alexander Petrov, two friends who work in sports nutrition and were visiting Salisbury due to an interest in its cathedral architecture.
Yakovenko claimed Bellingcat has “very close links to the British special services” and was “the tool of the deep establishment to leak certain things”, he said.
Asked to back up his claims, Yakovenko replied: “I cannot present you the evidence. This is some kind of information that we have.”
He claimed Moscow was the victim of an “aggressive anti-Russian campaign” by the British government, a “well-orchestrated campaign” to discredit Russia, supported by UK media.
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