NEW YORK (VINnews) — Sources close to Russian billionaire Roman Abramovich confirmed Monday that he had suffered symptoms of suspected poisoning at peace talks on the Ukraine-Belarus border earlier this month. The sources say that the Jewish billionaire, who has close ties to Putin as well as to Ukrainian leaders, reportedly suffered sore eyes and peeling skin. Two Ukrainian peace negotiators were also said to have been affected, but no other members of the negotiations were affected.
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A US official was quoted by Reuters as saying that the men’s symptoms were due to “environmental” factors and not poisoning but a senior chemical weapons expert, Hamish De Bretton-Gordon, told the BBC it was highly improbable that environmental factors had anything to do with it.
The investigative journalism group Bellingcat claimed that Mr Abramovich and the negotiators suffered symptoms “consistent with poisoning with chemical weapons”.
The symptoms included “eye and skin inflammation and piercing pain in the eyes”, Bellingcat reported.
One report claimed that Russian hardliners opposed to the peace talks had masterminded the poisoning.
BBC security correspondent Frank Gardner suggested that the US would want to dampen down suggestions that anyone – especially Russia – had used a chemical weapon in Ukraine, as this could push them into retaliatory action they are extremely reluctant to take.
The incident occurred on March 3rd and since then Abramovich and the other affected persons have recovered. Abramovich is continuing negotiations in an effort to end the war which has caused significant economic damage to him and to other Russian oligarchs affected by Western sanctions.
On Sunday, Ukraine’s President Volodymyr Zelensky said Mr Abramovich had offered him help to bring the Russian invasion to an end.
Abramovich travelled between Moscow and Kyiv for several rounds of talks at the start of the month. However the Kremlin now says he is not involved in the negotiations, which are currently being conducted between the two countries’ negotiating teams in Istanbul. In the wake of the previous suspected poisoning, the Ukrainian team has been instructed not to eat at the negotiations.