‘The most powerful tool we have against Russia is our unity, our partnerships abroad – including through NATO – make us stronger at home’, the Foreign Secretary Yvette Cooper writes
Two years ago in Munich, Yulia Navalny was forced to announce the tragic death of her husband Alexei Navalny at the hands of the Russian state.
Today, standing by her side, we have exposed the brutal and barbaric circumstances surrounding his death in a Russian prison. Laboratory testing has confirmed that the deadly toxin found in the skin of Ecuador dart frogs (epibatidine) was found in Alexei Navalny’s body and highly likely resulted in his death.
The Russian state had the means, motive and opportunity to deploy this lethal toxin to target Navalny during his imprisonment. Alongside other countries that have investigated this, we hold Russia responsible for his death.
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This is just one facet of a much broader pattern of malign activity — a pattern increasingly threatening European security and reaching British streets. Russia’s aggression runs from raining missiles down on innocent Ukrainian civilians to the steady expansion of hybrid threats across Europe and beyond.
After the end of the Cold War, we had hoped there would be a peace dividend, with the UK and Russia working in harmony side by side.
Those days are gone; those hopes dashed. We have to prepare for confronting Russian aggression haunting our continent, including hybrid threats, cyber-attacks, sabotage, industrial scale disinformation and attempts to undermine our democracy.
The UK will not sit back and tolerate Russia’s insidious behaviour. Prosecutions under our National Security Act have already exposed and deterred Russian-linked proxies. We have sanctioned the GRU – Russia’s foreign military intelligence agency – in its entirety and driven down Russia’s intelligence footprint across Europe. We are denying Putin the means to finance his Ukraine war including by tightening our chokehold on Russia’s shadow fleet vessels.
The most powerful tool we have is our unity. Our partnerships abroad – including through NATO – make us stronger at home. That is why I have been at the Munich Security Conference, working with allies behind a shared agenda for action — as the Prime Minister has set out. Russia wants us divided. Instead, its actions only strengthen our resolve.