AP Explains: Novichok that sickened Navalny a Cold War relic

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FILE-In this Sept.2, 2020 file photo a rescue vehicle drives in front of the central building of the Charite hospital where the Russian opposition leader Alexei Navalny is being treated, in Berlin, Germany. The German hospital treating Russian opposition leader Alexei Navalny for poisoning says his condition improved enough for him to be released from the facility. The Charite hospital in Berlin said Wednesday that after 32 days in care, Navalny’s condition “improved sufficiently for him to be discharged from acute inpatient care.” (AP Photo/Markus Schreiber)

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FILE - In this Tuesday, March 13, 2018 file photo, A police officer guards a cordon around a police tent covering the area where former Russian double agent Sergei Skripal and his daughter were found critically ill following exposure to the Russian-developed nerve agent Novichok in Salisbury, England.Novichok, a deadly nerve agent that has left Russian opposition politician Alexei Navalny in a coma and nearly killed a former Russian spy and his daughter in 2018, was the product of a highly secretive Soviet chemical weapons program. Just a few milligrams of the odorless liquid — the weight of a snowflake — are enough to kill a person within minutes. (AP Photo/Matt Dunham, File)

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FILE - In this Wednesday, May 23, 2018 file photo, Yulia Skripal poses for the media during an interview in London. Novichok, a deadly nerve agent that has left Russian opposition politician Alexei Navalny in a coma and nearly killed a former Russian spy and his daughter in 2018, was the product of a highly secretive Soviet chemical weapons program. Just a few milligrams of the odorless liquid — the weight of a snowflake — are enough to kill a person within minutes. (Dylan Martinez/Pool via AP, File)

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FILE-In this Wednesday Sept. 2, 2020 file photo an exterior view shows the central building of the Charite hospital where the Russian opposition leader Alexei Navalny is being treated, in Berlin, Germany. Berlin’s Justice Ministry has approved a request from Moscow for legal assistance in the investigation of the poisoning of opposition leader Alexei Navalny, and has tasked state prosecutors with working with Russian authorities. (AP Photo/Markus Schreiber, file)

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FILE - In this Friday, Aug. 21, 2020 file photo, police patrol an area, as journalists gather at the Omsk Ambulance Hospital No. 1, intensive care unit where Alexei Navalny was hospitalized in Omsk, Russia. Novichok, a deadly nerve agent that has left Russian opposition politician Alexei Navalny in a coma and nearly killed a former Russian spy and his daughter in 2018, was the product of a highly secretive Soviet chemical weapons program. Just a few milligrams of the odorless liquid — the weight of a snowflake — are enough to kill a person within minutes. (AP Photo/Evgeniy Sofiychuk, File)

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FILE - In this Saturday, Aug. 22, 2020 file photo, Russian dissident Alexei Navalny, not seen in photo, on a stretcher is transferred into an ambulance before being driven to an airport, at the Omsk Ambulance Hospital, in Omsk, Russia. Russian opposition leader Alexei Navalny was the victim of an attack and poisoned with the Soviet-era nerve agent Novichok, the German government said Wednesday, Sept 2, 2020 citing new test results. Navalny, a politician and corruption investigator who is one of Russian President Vladimir Putin’s fiercest critics, fell ill on a flight back to Moscow from Siberia on Aug 20 and was taken to a hospital in the Siberian city of Omsk after the plane made an emergency landing. (AP Photo/Evgeniy Sofiychuk, file)

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FILE - In this Sunday, Jan. 28, 2018 file photo, Russian opposition leader Alexei Navalny, center, attends a rally in Moscow, Russia. The German government says specialist labs in France and Sweden have confirmed Russian opposition leader Alexei Navalny was poisoned with the Soviet-era nerve agent Novichok. (AP Photo/Evgeny Feldman, File)

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FILE - In this Saturday, May 20, 2000 file photo, two Russian soldiers make a routine check of metal containers with toxic agents at a chemical weapons storage site in the town of Gorny, 124 miles (200 kms) south of the Volga River city of Saratov, Russia. Novichok, a deadly nerve agent that has left Russian opposition politician Alexei Navalny in a coma and nearly killed a former Russian spy and his daughter in 2018, was the product of a highly secretive Soviet chemical weapons program. Just a few milligrams of the odorless liquid — the weight of a snowflake — are enough to kill a person within minutes. (AP Photo, File)

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FILE - In this Oct. 4, 1987 file photo, a Soviet army serviceman in protective suit handles toxic substances during a visit by Western diplomats and journalists to a chemical weapons research facility in Shikhany, Saratov region, Russia. Novichok, a deadly nerve agent that has left Russian opposition politician Alexei Navalny in a coma and nearly killed a former Russian spy and his daughter in 2018, was the product of a highly secretive Soviet chemical weapons program. Just a few milligrams of the odorless liquid — the weight of a snowflake — are enough to kill a person within minutes. (Hans de Vreij via AP, File)

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FILE - In this Oct. 4, 1987 file photo, a lab rabbit rests in a container during a visit by Western diplomats and journalists to a chemical weapons research facility in Shikhany, Saratov region, Russia. Novichok, a deadly nerve agent that has left Russian opposition politician Alexei Navalny in a coma and nearly killed a former Russian spy and his daughter in 2018, was the product of a highly secretive Soviet chemical weapons program. Just a few milligrams of the odorless liquid — the weight of a snowflake — are enough to kill a person within minutes. (Hans de Vreij via AP, File)

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FILE - In this Oct. 4, 1987 file photo, a Soviet army officer presents ammunition rigged with chemical agents during a visit by Western diplomats and journalists to a chemical weapons research facility in Shikhany, Saratov region, Russia. Novichok, a deadly nerve agent that has left Russian opposition politician Alexei Navalny in a coma and nearly killed a former Russian spy and his daughter in 2018, was the product of a highly secretive Soviet chemical weapons program. Just a few milligrams of the odorless liquid — the weight of a snowflake — are enough to kill a person within minutes. (AP Photo/John Thor Dahlburg, File)

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FILE - In this Saturday, Feb. 29, 2020 file photo, Russian opposition activist Alexei Navalny takes part in a march in memory of opposition leader Boris Nemtsov in Moscow, Russia. Novichok, a deadly nerve agent that has left Russian opposition politician Alexei Navalny in a coma and nearly killed a former Russian spy and his daughter in 2018, was the product of a highly secretive Soviet chemical weapons program. Just a few milligrams of the odorless liquid — the weight of a snowflake — are enough to kill a person within minutes. (AP Photo/Pavel Golovkin, File)

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FILE - In this Saturday, Aug. 22, 2020 file photo, a stretcher is taken from special aircraft with the Kremlin critic Alexei Navalny on board at Tegel Airport in Berlin, Germany. Novichok, a deadly nerve agent that has left Russian opposition politician Alexei Navalny in a coma and nearly killed a former Russian spy and his daughter in 2018, was the product of a highly secretive Soviet chemical weapons program. Just a few milligrams of the odorless liquid — the weight of a snowflake — are enough to kill a person within minutes.( Michael Kappeler/dpa via AP, File)

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FILE - In this file photo provided by Alexei Navalny’s press team, early Saturday, Aug. 22, 2020, medics upload Alexei Navalny into a German special medical plane at an airport in Omsk, Russia. Novichok, a deadly nerve agent that has left Russian opposition politician Alexei Navalny in a coma and nearly killed a former Russian spy and his daughter in 2018, was the product of a highly secretive Soviet chemical weapons program. Just a few milligrams of the odorless liquid — the weight of a snowflake — are enough to kill a person within minutes. (Kira Yarmysh/Alexei Navalny’s press team via AP)

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German Chancellor Angela Merkel leaves after a statement about latest developments in the case of Russian opposition leader Alexei Navalny at the chancellery in Berlin, Germany, Wednesday, Sept. 2, 2020.Germany. Russian opposition leader Alexei Navalny was the victim of an attack and poisoned with the Soviet-era nerve agent Novichok, the German government said Wednesday, Sept. 2, 2020 citing new test results. (AP Photo/Markus Schreiber, Pool)

By FRANK JORDANS and VLADIMIR ISACHENKOV

MOSCOW (AP) — Novichok, a deadly nerve agent that has left Russian opposition politician Alexei Navalny in a coma and nearly killed a former Russian spy and his daughter in 2018, was the product of a highly secretive Soviet chemical weapons program. Here is a look at the agent and the history of its development.

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HOW LETHAL IS NOVICHOK?

Novichok, the nerve agent used in the attack that nearly killed former spy Sergei Skripal and his daughter, Yulia, in the English city of Salisbury on March 4, 2018, has been described as much deadlier than any U.S. equivalents.

Just a few milligrams of the odorless liquid — the weight of a snowflake — are enough to kill a person within minutes. The agent could be diluted to the desired concentration and added to food or drink, or applied to surfaces or clothes.

Scientists say the nerve agent could remain deadly for a long time — even if a few tiny drops are left in a syringe or impregnated into wood or fabric.

In the Salisbury attack, it was sprayed on the front door of Skripal’s house after being smuggled into Britain in a counterfeit Nina Ricci perfume bottle. The Skripals spent weeks in critical condition before recovering, and a local woman died after being exposed to the bottle, which was found by her boyfriend.

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WHAT DO THE RUSSIANS SAY ABOUT NOVICHEK POISONINGS?

Russia fiercely denied British accusations over the Skripals’ poisoning, accusing London and other Western nations of using the incident to fan an anti-Russian campaign. It has followed the same path of denial in this summer’s Navalny poisoning.

German Chancellor Angela Merkel on Wednesday called Navalny’s poisoning an attempted murder that aimed to silence one of Putin’s fiercest critics and called for a full investigation, saying “there are very serious questions now that only the Russian government can answer, and must answer.”

Russia, however, has demanded that Germany share its data backing up its conclusion that Navalny was poisoned and has called for a joint investigation effort.

President Vladimir Putin’s spokesman, Dmitry Peskov, insisted Thursday that “there is no reason to accuse the Russian state” over the poisoning. He said Moscow expects Berlin to provide information that would help a Russian probe into the cause of Navalny’s illness, and that Russia doctors in Siberia, where Navalny was taken after he fell ill on Aug. 20, found no evidence of poisoning.

Sergei Naryshkin, the head of the Russian Foreign Intelligence Service, even claimed it can’t be excluded that Navalny’s poisoning was a provocation of Western intelligence agencies.

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WHEN WAS NOVICHOK DESIGNED?

The Soviet program to design a new generation of chemical weapons began in the 1970s to counter the latest U.S. chemical weapons.

Soviet leaders wanted the equivalent of U.S. binary weapons — agents made up of relatively harmless components that turn deadly when mixed, making them easier to operate than regular chemical weapons. While Novichok class poisons were highly lethal, the program was only partly successful, as some of the components were as toxic as the military-grade nerve agents.

The Soviet leadership eventually lost interest in chemical weapons. Novichok-class agents only were manufactured in lab quantities. Vladimir Uglev, a top scientist in the program, has estimated about 100 kilograms (220 pounds) were made.

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IS IT POSSIBLE TO TRACE NOVICHOK’S SOURCE?

Russian experts who have worked on the Novichok class of agents have warned it may never be possible to determine the nerve agent’s origin.

To determine what specific lab produced a given sample of Novichok, it’s necessary to find an identical specimen from the same batch — an impossible task.

Facing accusations for the Skripals’s poisoning, Russia has charged that the U.S., Britain and other Western countries had acquired the expertise to make the nerve agent and that the Novichok used in that attack could have come from them.

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COULD IT FALL INTO THE WRONG HANDS?

The main Soviet research center that designed the Novichok-class agents was in Shikhany, a town in southwestern Russia. It was one of the “closed cities” isolated by the KGB. The sprawling facility also housed chemical depots and a military firing range, where nerve agents were tested throughout the Cold War.

Some Novichok-related research also was conducted at a main Moscow research center, which shared samples with other labs across the Soviet Union.

Despite the U.S. oversight to dismantle Russia’s chemical arsenals after the Soviet collapse, scientists involved in the program said they couldn’t exclude that some lab workers might have been tempted to sell toxic substances amid the economic and political turmoil in the 1990s.

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MURKY STATUS

Moscow said in 2017 it completed the destruction of 40,000 metric tons of chemical weapons left over from the Soviet era, an effort that spanned two decades under close international oversight.

The Novichok-class agents weren’t originally mentioned in the Chemical Weapons Convention, an international document that outlawed chemical weapons.

Last year, however, they were added to the list of chemicals that require special verification measures under the treaty’s provisions. The move came after the 2018 Salisbury attack and marked the first time the list had been updated.

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Frank Jordans reported from Berlin.