Poisoned daughter better as UK-Russia dispute at UN worsens

The daughter of a former Russian spy poisoned by a nerve agent said Thursday in her first public comment that she's recovering even as the international furor over the attack intensified, with Russia warning Britain it is "playing with fire."

At the United Nations, Russia claimed that intelligence services of other countries were probably behind the attack. But Britain's U.N. Ambassador Karen Piece shot back that Russia has come up with 24 theories on who bears responsibility for the poisoning, but the United Kingdom has only one — that it's highly likely Russia was responsible.

Buses wait to carry expelled diplomats to leave the U.S. Embassy in Moscow, Russia, Thursday, April 5, 2018. Russia last week ordered 60 American diplomats to leave the country by Thursday, in retaliation for the United States expelling the same number of Russians. (AP Photo/Pavel Golovkin)

Yulia Skripal, 33, said in a statement released by British police that her "strength is growing daily" and she expressed gratitude to those who came to her aid when she and her father, Sergei, were found unconscious on a bench a month ago.

"I am sure you appreciate that the entire episode is somewhat disorientating, and I hope that you'll respect my privacy and that of my family during the period of my convalescence," she said.

The hospital in the English city of Salisbury confirmed that Yulia's health has improved, while her 66-year-old father, Sergei Skripal, remains in critical condition.

Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov attends a meeting with China's Defense Minister Wei Fenghe in Moscow, Russia, Thursday, April 5, 2018. Russia's top diplomat has dismissed the recent expulsions of Russian diplomats as a mockery of international law. (AP Photo/Pavel Golovkin)

At the U.N., the confrontation between Russia and Britain and more than two dozen Western allies who have expelled over 150 Russian diplomats in a show of solidarity intensified.

Russia's U.N. Ambassador Vassily Nebenzia claimed that Russia that was the victim of a hasty, sloppy and ill-intentioned defamation campaign by Britain and its allies.

Moscow assumes "with a high degree of probability" that the intelligence services of other countries are likely responsible for the incident, Ambassador Vassily Nebenzia said.

Russian ambassador to the UK Alexander Vladimirovich Yakovenko speaks about the Salisbury incident, during a news conference at the Russian Embassy in London, Thursday April 5, 2018. Britain has blamed Russia for the March 4 poisoning of Sergei Skripal and his daughter. (Yui Mok/PA via AP)

"Since the British authorities dare to state that behind the incident in Salisbury is Russia's responsibility with a high degree of probability, well we also with a high degree of probability are assuming that the intelligence services of certain countries are behind the mega-provocation," he said.

Nebenzia said "everything confirms this is a coordinated, very well-planned campaign" intended "to discredit and even delegitimize Russia."

He refused to name the intelligence services that Russia suspects, but said their goal is to accuse Moscow of using "a horrible, inhumane weapon, of concealing the arsenal of this substance," of violating the Chemical Weapons Convention, and putting in question Russia's "role not only in finding a solution in Syria, but anywhere else."

Russian ambassador to the UK Alexander Yakovenko prepares to speak about the Salisbury incident, during a news conference at the Russian Embassy in London, Thursday April 5, 2018. Britain has blamed Russia for the March 4 nerve agent attack on former double agent Sergei Skripal and his daughter Yulia in Salisbury, England. (Yui Mok/PA via AP)

He also warned: "We have told our British colleagues that you are playing with fire and you will be sorry."

Britain's Pierce said Russia's 24 theories for the attack include blaming it on terrorists and saying Britain wanted to distract from Brexit, its departure from the European Union.

After trading barbs about Sherlock Holmes, Nebenzia and Pierce resorted to nonsensical fantasy with the Russian ambassador reading a passage from Alice in Wonderland and the British ambassador responding with a witty passage from the book that says: "I believe in as many as six impossible things before breakfast."

Adding to the intrigue was a recording aired Thursday by Russian state Rossiya TV of a purported phone call between Yulia Skripal and her cousin in Russia. In the call, Yulia Skripal allegedly said she and her father were both recovering and in normal health, and that her father's health was not irreparably damaged.

Russian Ambassador to the United Nations Vassily Nebenzia, left, greets British Ambassador to the United Nations Karen Pierce before a Security Council meeting on the situation between Britain and Russia, Thursday, April 5, 2018 at UN headquarters. (AP Photo/Mary Altaffer)

Rossiya TV said Skripal's niece, Viktoria, who lives in Moscow, gave it the purported recording, although the broadcaster said it could not verify its authenticity.

Moscow has steadfastly hammered away at Britain's account of what befell the Skripals on March 4, especially the claim that their exposure to a Novichok nerve agent developed by the Soviet Union meant the attack was carried out by Russia.

During the Security Council meeting, Nebenzia questioned the British government's claims of Russian responsibility by posing a series of questions.

He asked why the British policeman was affected by the nerve agent immediately when it took four hours for Skirpal and his daughter to be affected. He asked what antidotes for exposure to Novichok the Skripals were given, where the Skirpals were for four hours without cellphones on the day of the attack, and what happened to two cats and two guinea pigs in the Skirpal's house.

Russia has said it never produced Novichok and completed the destruction of its chemical arsenals under international control last year. Nebenzia insisted that Britain is required to allow Russia to cooperate in the investigation.

"Great Britain refuses to cooperate with us on the pretext that the victim does not cooperate with the criminal," he said. "A crime was committed on British territory, possibly a terrorist act, and it is our citizens who are the victims."

Russian Ambassador to the United Nations Vassily Nebenzia holds up a copy of "Alice's Adventures in Wonderland" as he speaks during a Security Council meeting on the situation between Britain and Russia Thursday, April 5, 2018 at United Nations headquarters. (AP Photo/Mary Altaffer)

He said both Skripal and Yulia are Russian citizens, and Moscow must be granted access to them.

Pierce said the U.K. has left it to Yulia to decide whether to give Russia consular access to her.

Moscow has sent home an equal number of envoys — more than 150 — in an all-out diplomatic war unseen even at the height of the Cold War.

As part of the diplomatic row, Russia last week ordered 60 U.S. diplomats to leave the country by Thursday in retaliation for Washington's expulsion of the same number of Russians.

Three buses believed to be carrying expelled American diplomats left the U.S. Embassy in Moscow early Thursday after loading their luggage on trucks. Some toted pet carriers.

Ahead of the U.N. meeting, Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov described the British accusations against Moscow as a mockery of international law. He sarcastically likened the British accusations to the queen from Alice in Wonderland urging "sentence first — verdict afterward."

Russian Ambassador to the United Nations Vassily Nebenzia, left, speaks to British Ambassador to the United Nations Karen Pierce at the end of a Security Council meeting on the situation between Britain and Russia Thursday, April 5, 2018 at United Nations headquarters. (AP Photo/Mary Altaffer)

"The so-called Skripal case has been used as a fictitious, orchestrated pretext for the unfounded massive expulsions of Russian diplomats not only from the U.S. and Britain, but also from a number of other countries who simply had their arms twisted," Lavrov said in Moscow.

The British government says it relied on a combination of scientific analysis and other intelligence to conclude that the nerve agent came from Russia. But the Foreign Office on Wednesday deleted a tweet from last month that said scientists at Britain's defense research facility, the Porton Down laboratory, had identified the substance as "made in Russia."

President Vladimir Putin's envoy for cybersecurity, Alexander Krutskikh, mocked the contradictory statements, saying that "the latest developments around the Skripal case indicate the days of this British Cabinet are numbered."

WASHINGTON (AP) — Lawyers for an American believed to be held by the Taliban for nearly two years are asking a United Nations human rights investigator to intervene, citing what they say is cruel and inhumane treatment.

Ryan Corbett was abducted Aug. 10, 2022, after returning to Afghanistan, where he and his family had been living at the time of the collapse of the U.S.-based government there a year earlier. He arrived on a valid 12-month visa to pay and train staff as part of a business venture he led aimed at promoting Afghanistan's private sector through consulting services and lending.

Corbett has since been shuttled between multiple prisons, though his lawyers say he has not been seen since last December by anyone other than the people with whom he was detained.

In a petition sent Thursday, lawyers for Corbett say that he's been threatened with physical violence and torture and has been malnourished and deprived of medical care. He's been held in solitary confinement, including in a basement cell with almost no sunlight and exercise, and his physical and mental health have significantly deteriorated, the lawyers say.

Corbett has been able to speak with his family by phone five times since his arrest, including last month. His family has not been able to see him — his only visits have been two check-ins from a third-party government — and their characterizations of his mistreatment are based on accounts from recently released prisoners who were with him and his openly dispirited tone in conversations.

“During Mr. Corbett’s most recent call with his wife and children, Mr. Corbett indicated that the mental torture and anguish have caused him to lose all hope,” said the petition, signed by the Corbett family attorneys, Ryan Fayhee and Kate Gibson.

The petition is addressed to Alice Edwards, an independent human rights investigator and the special rapporteur for torture in the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights at the U.N. It asks Edwards, who was appointed by the U.N. Human Rights Council, to “urgently reach out to the Taliban to secure Mr. Corbett’s immediate release and freedom from torture, as guaranteed by international law.”

"This situation is just dragging on, and I’m increasingly concerned and taking steps that I hope will make a difference and help the situation — just increasingly concerned and panicking about Ryan’s deteriorating health and physical and mental health," Corbett's wife, Anna, said in an interview. “And that was leading me to take this next step.”

The U.S. government is separately working to get Corbett home and has designated him as wrongfully detained. A State Department spokesman told reporters last month that officials had continually pressed for Corbett's release and were “using every lever we can to try to bring Ryan and these other wrongfully detained Americans home from Afghanistan."

A spokesperson for the Interior Ministry in Afghanistan said this week that it had no knowledge of Corbett's case.

Corbett, of Dansville, New York, first visited Afghanistan in 2006 and relocated there with his family in 2010, supervising several non-governmental organizations.

The family was forced to leave Afghanistan in August 2021 when the Taliban captured Kabul, but he returned the following January so that he could renew his business visa. Given the instability on the ground, the family discussed the trip and “we were all pretty nervous,” Corbett's wife said.

But after that first uneventful trip, he returned to the country in August 2022 to train and pay his staff and resume a business venture that involved consulting services, microfinance lending and evaluating international development projects.

While on a trip to the northern Jawzjan province, Corbett and a Western colleague were confronted by armed members of the Taliban and were taken first to a police station and later to an underground prison.

Anna Corbett said that when she learned her husband had been taken to a police station, she got “really scared” but that he was optimistic the situation would be quickly resolved.

That, however, did not happen, and Anna Corbett, who has three teenage children and makes regular trips to Washington, said she's trying to advocate as forcefully as she can while not letting “anxiety take over.”

“I feel like it’s the uncertainty of all of it that just is so difficult because you just don’t know what’s going to come at you — what call, what news," she said. "And I’m worried about Ryan and the effect of the trauma on him and then also on my kids, just what they’re experiencing. I've tried to protect them the best I could, but this is so difficult.”

Associated Press writer Riazat Butt in Kabul, Afghanistan, contributed to this report.

This family photo shows Ryan Corbett holding rabbits with his daughter Miriam and son Caleb in Kabul, Afghanistan in 2020. Lawyers for Corbett, believed held by the Taliban for nearly two years, are asking a United Nations human rights investigator to intervene, citing what they say is cruel and inhumane treatment. Corbett was abducted on August 10, 2022 after returning to Afghanistan, where he and his family had been living at the time of the collapse of the U.S.-based government there one year earlier, on a valid 12-month business visa to pay and train staff. (AP Photo/Anna Corbett)