The poison used against Ukrainian President Viktor Yushchenko has been traced back to a chemical weapons laboratory in that nation, the London Daily Telegraph reported today (see GSN, Dec. 20, 2004). 

Yushchenko said the poison — a form of dioxin known as TCDD — was produced in a Ukrainian laboratory “in apparent violation of international laws” forbidding chemical weapon development.

Ukrainian authorities said they know who was behind the poisoning. Yushchenko noted that security services in the former Soviet Union had used the poison, according to the Telegraph.

Ukrainian security service chief Petro Poroshenko said the poisoning involved “specialists belonging to an existing or former secret service.”   Yushchenko added that a “lot of new information” has been discovered which would lead to the culprits’ arrests (Robin Gedye, Daily Telegraph, July 1).

Courtesy of Global Security Newswire