Overview
- The UK announced travel bans and asset freezes on seven named scientists and two research institutes on Monday, July 6, 2026.
- Those sanctioned include directors and senior researchers at SC Signal and GNIII VM and a director at GosNIIOKhT, with individuals named by the Foreign Office as Artur Zhirov, Andrei Antokhin, Sergei Chepur, Vladimir Kondratyev, Aleksandr Makhlay, Ivan Kravstov and Viktor Taranchenko.
- The Foreign Office said the measures target people it says helped develop Novichok nerve agents and the highly toxic Epibatidine compound that Western labs and governments have linked to the 2018 Salisbury attacks and the 2024 poisoning that killed Alexei Navalny.
- The UK framed the sanctions as coordinated pressure with European partners after EU action earlier in the week and as a message ahead of the NATO summit in Ankara and the OPCW Executive Council meeting in The Hague.
- Officials noted the steps could increase diplomatic and enforcement pressure on Russia, tighten sanctions screening for labs and suppliers, and further strain UK-Russia security ties after a separate defence claim about a Russian aircraft approaching a British carrier strike group.