New round of "meddling and cyber attack" accusations

Russia believes a new round of accusations against it of cyber attacks and meddling in the affairs of the United States and other Western countries will follow, Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Sergei Ryabkov told reporters on Thursday.

"Our American counterparts, just like colleagues in other countries who share the current wave of accusations against Russia, will not stop here. New rounds will follow," the senior diplomat said. "All that will be done at certain intervals to keep the issue high on the agenda so that Russian and Western reporters constantly have reasons to ask questions and obtain comments."

Dutch Defense Minister Ank Bijleveld earlier claimed at a news conference that Dutch military intelligence and security services had foiled an attack by Russian hackers against the OPCW. She alleged that four Russians - Alexey Morenets, Yevgeny Serebryakov, Oleg Sotnikov and Alexey Minin - were involved in the incident. Bijleveld claimed that all four worked for the Main Directorate (formerly the Main Intelligence Directorate, the GRU) of Russia’s General Staff. According to the minister, the equipment confiscated from them was evidence that they had tried to get access to information about the Malaysian MH17 flight disaster in Ukraine.

The Dutch Defense Ministry asserts that the cyberattack was carried out on April 13. All four Russian suspects were expelled on the same day.