Filmmaker Oliver Stone recently interviewed the President of the Russian Federation, Vladimir Putin. The transcript<\/a> <\/strong><\/span>was published yesterday evening. Most of the interview is about Ukraine. A separate piece will cover that country. There is also a passage about the U.S. election.<\/span><\/p>\n But the most interesting bits from Putin are about the Skripal affair.<\/span><\/p>\n The British and Russian double agent Sergei Skripal and his daughter Julia were impaired by some chemical substance in early March 2018 in Salisbury. Britain blamed the incident on Russia. CIA Director Gina Haspel, a former CIA station chief in London, used fake pictures<\/strong><\/span><\/a> of the incident to deceive Trump and to push him to kick out 60 Russian diplomats. (The NYT<\/em> later ran cover<\/a> <\/strong><\/span>for Haspel.)<\/span><\/p>\n We have speculated since the very beginning of the Skirpal case that the ‘former’ spy wanted to go back to Russia. Putin now confirms<\/a><\/strong><\/span>, to my knowledge for the first time, that this was the case (underline added):<\/span><\/p>\n Oliver Stone:<\/strong> What has happened to Skripal? Where is he?<\/span><\/p>\n Vladimir Putin:<\/strong> I\u00a0have no idea. He is a\u00a0spy, after all. He is always in\u00a0hiding.<\/span><\/p>\n Oliver Stone:<\/strong> They say he was going to\u00a0come back to\u00a0Russia. He had some information.<\/span><\/p>\n Vladimir Putin:<\/strong> Yes, I\u00a0have been told that he wants to\u00a0make a\u00a0written request to\u00a0come back.<\/span><\/p>\n Oliver Stone:<\/strong> He knew still and\u00a0he wanted to\u00a0come back. He had information that he could give to\u00a0the\u00a0world press here<\/u> in\u00a0Russia.<\/span><\/p>\n Vladimir Putin:<\/strong> I\u00a0doubt it. He has broken the\u00a0ranks already. What kind of\u00a0information can he possess?<\/span><\/p>\n The information Sergei Skripal possessed might have been related to the U.S. election and the Steele dossier which alleged that Russia had dirt on Trump. On March 8 2018, only a few days after the Sergei and Julia Skripal were allegedly poisoned, we discussed the connection in our first post on the Skripal affair<\/strong><\/span><\/a>:<\/span><\/p>\n