UK imposes chemical-weapons sanctions on seven Russians and two state institutes over Navalny and Amesbury cases

Britain on Monday imposed chemical-weapons sanctions on seven Russian individuals and two state-linked research institutes, saying they were involved in developing toxic agents linked to the death of Alexei Navalny and the killing of Dawn Sturgess in England.

The sanctions, announced by the Foreign, Commonwealth & Development Office on July 6, were made under the U.K.’s chemical weapons sanctions regime. Measures under that regime can include asset freezes, bans on making funds available to designated people or entities, and immigration restrictions or travel bans. The government said the move came ahead of this week’s NATO summit on July 7-8 and an executive council session of the Organisation for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons, or OPCW, in The Hague on July 7-10.

The designated institutes are SC SIGNAL, also known as NTs SIGNAL, which Britain described as a Russian state scientific research institute, and GNIII VM, the State Research Institute of Military Medicine. The seven sanctioned individuals are Artur Zhirov, Andrei Antokhin, Sergei Chepur, Vladimir Kondratyev, Aleksandr Makhlay, Ivan Kravstov and Viktor Taranchenko.

Britain said the sanctions target people and institutes involved in the “research, development and production” of Novichok nerve agents and the toxin epibatidine. The linkages are separate: Novichok was the agent tied to the 2018 Salisbury and Amesbury poisonings in southern England, and Sturgess died on July 8, 2018, after exposure in Amesbury. Epibatidine was identified in samples related to Navalny in a joint statement issued Feb. 14, 2026, by Britain, Sweden, France, Germany and the Netherlands. Navalny, the Russian opposition leader, died on Feb. 16, 2024, while in Russian custody, according to Russian authorities.

In its release, the British government said: “Only the Russian state had the means, motive and opportunity to deploy this lethal toxin to target Navalny, and the UK holds it responsible for his death.” Foreign Secretary Yvette Cooper said, “Russia’s repeated use of chemical weapons is a sickening violation of international law and a direct threat to global security. … We will continue to call out Russia’s violations of the Chemical Weapons Convention, hold those responsible to account, and work with allies to deter further use of these dangerous weapons.”

The announcement extends an earlier line of British sanctions tied to Russian chemical-weapons work. In October 2020, the U.K. sanctioned GosNIIOKhT in connection with Novichok-related activity. The new measures broaden that effort to additional scientists and institutes as European governments press the Navalny case at the OPCW. In their February 2026 statement, Britain and four allies said laboratory analyses had “conclusively confirmed the presence of epibatidine” in samples related to Navalny and said they would refer the matter to the OPCW. The legal framing matters because epibatidine is not a classic battlefield nerve agent like Novichok. But the OPCW Secretariat has said that “any use of a toxic chemical for its toxic properties to kill or harm people, regardless of its origin or method of production, is considered a chemical weapon under the Chemical Weapons Convention.”