‘Actions speak louder than words’: Wife of policeman poisoned by novichok responds to Boris Johnson’s tweet on Alexei Navalny

Prime minister says UK will work with international partners to bring about justice

Russian opposition leader Alexei Navalny pictured giving a speech in Moscow on 29 September, 2019. (Yuri KADOBNOV / AFP)

The wife of a police officer who became critically ill after responding to the Salisbury poisonings has told the prime minister that “actions speak louder than words”, following the suspected use of novichok against Russian opposition leader Alexei Navalny.

On Wednesday, the German government said in a statement that Mr Navalny, who is currently being treated at a hospital in Berlin, had been poisoned by the same nerve agent that was used in the Wiltshire town in 2018.

In response to the announcement, Boris Johnson and other world leaders sought urgent answers from Moscow.

Describing the use of novichok as “outrageous”, Mr Johnson said on Twitter: "We have seen first-hand the deadly consequences of novichok in the UK.”

"The Russian government must now explain what happened to Mr Navalny – we will work with international partners to ensure justice is done,” he added.

Sarah Bailey, the wife of police officer Nick Bailey, who almost died after his exposure to the Soviet-era chemical weapon in 2018, replied to the prime ministers’ tweet.

In a message posted on Wednesday night, she said: "Justice would be nice. Actions speak louder than words."

Mr Bailey, who was the first person to enter Sergei Skripal’s house after the former spy and his daughter had been found poisoned, also wrote a short reply to the prime minister’s message.

"I have so much that I want to say about this tweet. But I can't, and I won't,” he said.

Since his release from hospital, Mr Bailey has made three attempts to return to work and has said he is "still trying to pick up the pieces” of his life.

While he and the Skripals survived being exposed to Novichok, Dawn Sturgess, 44, died after coming across and touching the perfume bottle that Russian agents had kept it in.

Mr Navalny had been flying from Siberia to Moscow when he was taken ill. The flight performed an emergency landing at Omsk, with the Kremlin critic later being transferred to Germany.

After announcing that there was “unequivocal evidence” that a nerve agent had been used, German Chancellor Angela Merkel said: “There are serious questions that only Russia can answer.”

Additional reporting from Press Association