The two men have claimed they are sport nutritionists and in an interview, ridiculed by the British media and government, with the Kremlin-directed RT network, insisted they had gone to Salisbury, twice, to see the cathedral’s spire and ancient clock. Their first day trip was a failure because of slush and snow, they said, although according to weather data there was no snow in the cathedral town on March 3.
The investigative journalism consortium Bellingcat, along with the news-site The Insider, say they have identified the decorated veteran, who used the alias Ruslan Boshirov, by trawling through open-source records of the graduates of Russian military academies and then matching his photograph. Leaked data of Chepiga’s real passport provided final proof.
‘Fake news’
The Russian Foreign Ministry says the Bellingcat identification is “fake news.”
And Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov told reporters Thursday: “Like you, we are just learning of this investigation in the media released that talks about certain people resembling certain other people.” Other Kremlin officials say many people resemble each other.
Chepiga’s apparent identification as one of the likely culprits of the assassination attempt using the rare toxin Novichok leaves in tatters the Kremlin claim that it had no involvement in the attack, say British officials. His seniority in the GRU, they argue, suggests the attack was sanctioned from the top of the Kremlin.
Bellingcat says aside from its own open-source probe, “multiple sources familiar with the person and/or the investigation have confirmed the suspect’s identity.” British officials say they have no dispute with the identification. But they are not officially confirming it and have not said in detail why, arguing they are unable to for security reasons.

Locals in Chepiga’s home village, Berezovka, 640 kilometers east of Moscow in the Amur region, interviewed by the Russian newspaper Kommersant, confirm the identification and say they knew it was him even before the Bellingcat investigation. They say they recognized him from the CCTV footage British authorities released. Kommersant says the locals spoke on the condition of anonymity, fearing retribution.
“Yeah, that’s Tolya,” one woman told the newspaper, using Chepiga’s nickname. She says he was a disciplined youth. “He didn’t drink, didn’t smoke, and never got involved with any bad crowd,” she said.
Security analysts say it is possible that Chepiga and Skripal, a former GRU officer, knew each other. If so, it would add a personal element to the nerve agent attack. Skripal also served in Afghanistan, although not in a special forces unit but with Soviet Airborne Troops and many years earlier.
Skripal and his daughter survived the March nerve-agent attack, but a local woman not connected to the original attack died in July after being exposed to the same toxin, which was contained in a discarded perfume bottle dumped in a trash bin.
Skripal was a double agent for British intelligence in the 1990s. In December 2004, he was arrested by Russian authorities, tried, convicted of high treason and sentenced to 13 years in prison. He was included in a 2010 spy swap and settled in Salisbury.
Britain, the United States and most European Union countries responded to the Salisbury attack with expulsions of Russian diplomats and financial sanctions on Russia. The Kremlin denies any involvement in the attack and has maintained variously that the poisoning never happened, that it was carried out by Britain in order to blame Russia or that unknown third parties were responsible.

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A police officer stands guard outside the Zizzi restaurant where Sergei and Yulia had lunch before they collapsed in a nearby park

March 4, afternoon – Sergei and Yulia Skripal visit the Bishops Mill pub.
March 4, 2.20pm to 3.35pm – Sergei and Yulia Skripal have lunch at the Zizzi restaurant.
March 4, 4.15pm – Emergency services are called by a passer-by concerned about a man and a woman in Salisbury city centre.
Officers find the Skripals unconscious on a bench. They are taken to Salisbury District Hospital, where they remain in critical condition.
March 5, morning – Police say two people in Salisbury are being treated for suspected exposure to an unknown substance.

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Detective Sergeant Nick Bailey was among the first police officers on the scene and was himself hospitalised

March 5, afternoon – Wiltshire Police, along with Public Health England, declare a ‘major incident’
March 7 – Police announce that the Skripals were likely poisoned with a nerve agent in a targeted murder attempt.
They disclose that a police officer who responded to the incident is in serious condition in a hospital.
March 8 – Home Secretary Amber Rudd describes the use of a nerve agent on UK soil was a ‘brazen and reckless act’ of attempted murder
March 9 – About 180 troops trained in chemical warfare and decontamination are deployed to Salisbury to help with the police investigation.
Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov says Moscow might be willing to assist with the investigation but expresses resentment at suggestions the Kremlin was behind the attack.
March 11 – Public health officials tell people who visited the Zizzi restaurant or Bishops Mill pub in Salisbury on the day of the attack or the next day to wash their clothes as a precaution.
March 12, morning- Prime Minister Theresa May tells the House of Commons that the Skripals were poisoned with Novichok, a military-grade nerve agent developed by the Soviet Union during the Cold War.
March 12, afternoon – Public Health England ask everyone who visited Salisbury town centre on the day of the attack to wash all of their clothes and belongings.

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Officers wearing chemical protection suits secure the forensic tent over the bench where Sergei and Yulia fell ill

March 14 – The PM announces the expulsion of 23 suspected Russian spies from the country’s UK Embassy.
March 22 – Nick Bailey, the police officer injured in the attack, is released from hospital.
March 26 – The United States and 22 other countries join Britain in expelling scores of Russian spies from capitals across the globe.
March 29 – Doctors say Yulia Skripal is ‘improving rapidly’ in hospital.
‘Unknown time in the spring’  – Dutch authorities expelled two suspected Russian spies who tried to hack into a Swiss laboratory
April 3 – The chief of the Porton Down defence laboratory said it could not verify the ‘precise source’ of the nerve agent.
April 5, morning – Yulia Skripal’s cousin Viktoria says she has received a call from Yulia saying she plans to leave hospital soon.

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Dawn Sturgess died in hospital on July 8

April 5, afternoon – A statement on behalf of Yulia is released by Metropolitan Police, in which she says her strength is ‘growing daily’ and that ‘daddy is fine’.
April 9 – Ms Skripal is released from hospital and moved to a secure location.
May 18 – Sergei Skripal is released from hospital 11 weeks after he was poisoned.
June 30 – Dawn Sturgess and Charlie Rowley fall ill at a property in Amesbury, which is eight miles from Salisbury, and are rushed to hospital.
July 4 – Police declare a major incident after Ms Sturgess and Mr Rowley are exposed to an ‘unknown substance’, later revealed to be Novichok.
July 5 – Sajid Javid demands an explanation over the two poisonings as he accuses the Russian state of using Britain as a ‘dumping ground for poison’.
July 8 – Mother-of-three Dawn Sturgess, 44, dies in hospital due to coming into contact with Novichok.
July 10 – Mr Rowley regains consciousness at hospital, and later tells his brother that Dawn had sprayed the Novichok onto her wrists.
July 19 – Police are believed to have identified the perpetrators of the attack.
August 20 –  Charlie Rowley is rushed to hospital as he starts to lose his site, but doctors can’t confirm whether it has anything to do with the poisoning.
August 26 – Charlie Rowley admitted to intensive care unit with meningitis
August 28  – Police call in the ‘super recognisers’  in bid to track down the poisoners
September 4 –  Charlie Rowley’s brother says he has ‘lost all hope’ and doesn’t have long to live.
Independent investigators, the Organisation for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons, confirm the toxic chemical that killed Ms Sturgess was the same nerve agent as that which poisoned the Skripals.
September 5 – Scotland Yard and CPS announce enough evidence to charge Russian nationals Alexander Petrov and Ruslan Boshirov for conspiracy to murder over Salisbury nerve agent attack.
September 13 – Britain’s most wanted men speak to RT and claim to be humble tourists
September 26 – The real identity of one of the two assassins, named by police as Ruslan Boshirov, is reported to be Colonel Anatoliy Vladimirovich Chepiga.

The spotter would have travelled alone to assess the location before Ruslan Boshirov and Alexander Petrov brought toxic nerve agent Novichok into the UK in a perfume bottle.
They are suspected of poisoning Russian defector Skripal and his daughter Yulia by smearing Novichok on his front door before heading back to Moscow.

The Skripals both survived, but local woman Dawn Sturgess died after her partner Charlie Rowley found the perfume bottle used to dispense the poison.
It is believed that security chiefs have identified the new suspect who came to Salisbury to scope out the intended target.
Skripal suspect ‘true identity’ revealed as decorated Russian colonel
Philip Ingram, a former intelligence and security officer, told The Telegraph: “There was almost certainly intelligence on the ground before the attack was carried out, it is what is called a pattern of life study.
“They wouldn’t have turned up at the house and put it on the door handle on a whim.”
It follows reports that security services are investigating four other suspects believed to be linked to the attack – and analysis from a former Russian spy who said kill teams would tend to operate in teams of six.

Ex-spy Boris Karpichkov, 59, told the Mirror that eavesdroppers from Russian spy agency the FSB would have monitored Yulia Skripal’s mobile, email, internet and Skype before she travelled to the UK to meet her father.
The team would have formed a  “Special Operations Group”, or SOG, and cloned the passports of prisoners in other EU states to travel without visas – and some members may still be laying low following the attack.
Suspect Ruslan Boshirov has recently been identified by the investigative journalism bureau Bellingcat as a decorated GRU Colonel, Anatoliy Chepiga – despite repeated claims from Kremlin that his picture “means nothing to us”.

Chepiga, 39, served in wars in Chechnya and Ukraine. He was made a Hero of the Russian Federation by decree of President Vladimir Putin in 2014.
Prime Minister Theresa May damned Russia for the attack at an address to the UN Security Council on Tuesday.
She said: “We have taken appropriate action, with our allies, and we will continue to take the necessary steps to ensure our collective security.

“Russia has only sought to obfuscate through desperate fabrication.”
Moscow continues to deny claims of involvement, as officials called out Mrs May for refusing to present her evidence to them.
The country’s Ambassador to London, Alexander Yakovenko, tweeted yesterday, quoting Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov: “London arrogantly demands that we take responsibility for the crime just because they have some “evidence” no one has ever seen and they would not present it to the public. Frankly speaking, this is just childish.
“London violates at least three or four treaties and refuses to answer any questions. As for me, it is a clear sign of guilty conscience.”

The Russian embassy said in a statement: “The UK is refusing to provide the Russian investigation with any information or evidence gathered by British Police when working on the Salisbury incident.
“British authorities (earlier) announced that they did not intend to pursue extradition of the “suspects” and made it clear that they were not interested in submitting their own requests for legal assistance, which could be provided by means of interrogation of certain persons, provision of access to documents, etc.”
A Home Office spokeswoman said: “We set out our position clearly this month. The Police and CPS have identified two men as the prime suspects in the attack in Salisbury. We have repeatedly asked Russia to account for what happened in Salisbury in March, and they have replied with obfuscation and lies.
“We want these men to face justice in the UK and have taken steps to ensure that if they ever leave Russia in the future they can be arrested, detained and brought to the UK.”