Diskussioner om Skripal-fallet

The UK newspaper Daily Mail has quoted an intelligence source as saying that a woman may have been at the helm of a six-strong group from Russia's Main Intelligence Directorate who carried out an alleged chemical weapons attack on the Skripals in the British town of Salisbury earlier this year.

"It makes sense that a female officer may have been part of the team, playing a key role," the source said.

Breaking: US hits #Russia with new sanctions for use of chemical weapon in #Skripal poisoning in UK - most definitive US confirmation of Russian responsibility to date.

While the US expelled some five dozen diplomats shortly after the poisoning, the administration stopped short of making a formal determination that Russia had broken international law.

But Congress has been pushing for such a decision and now the state department has confirmed Russia's actions contravened 1991 US legislation on the use of chemical weapons. That breach automatically triggers the imposition of sanctions and places requirements on Russia to avert further restrictions in three months time.

Those requirements could include opening up sites in Russia for inspection - a move Moscow would probably resist.

So far President Donald Trump has been silent on this latest move - which could well derail his attempts to develop a new, warmer relationship with Vladimir Putin.

British prosecutors name the two Russians suspected of poisoning Skripals