Apocalyptic claims from one of Putin's closest henchmen of a radioactive cloud heading across Europe have been ridiculed by experts.
The doomsday prediction was made by Nikolai Patrushev, who has alleged the deadly cloud was wafting west from Ukraine after Russian troops hit an arms depot containing depleted uranium ammunition supplied by the UK government.
Ex-KGB Patrushev is secretary of Russia's security council and reportedly one of warlord Putin's closest security aides and maintained flames erupted high into the sky in a fiery mushroom cloud after the hit.
But after declaring Poland had already seen soaring levels of radiation following the strike, Patrushev was quickly shut down by experts who described the claims as propaganda.
“Their destruction caused a radioactive cloud now moving towards Western Europe,” Patrushev's statement said.
“And Poland has already recorded an increase in radiation.”
The former FSB chief and war hawk also claimed at a meeting in Syktyvkar: “Furthermore, the US is developing and already using chemical and biological weapons, including in Ukraine.
“So that’s what American aid and democracy is all about.”
Russian state TV which prominently broadcast Patrushev’s claim said he was referring to a strike on a facility in Khmelnytskyi.
“A column of smoke from the explosion rose several hundred metres and a prolonged detonation followed,” stated Channel One.
“Then there was a rise in radioactivity in the area.”
But experts from Khmelnytskyi National University had “debunked Russian fakes about an increase in radiation levels in the city following the attack by Russian forces on the night of 13 May,” reported Ukrinform.
“Previously, Russian propaganda began spreading information on social media and news channels about an increased radiation background in Khmelnytskyi, allegedly caused by an explosion damaging either low-enriched uranium shells or components of a bomb sent to Ukraine.”
A statement from the university said: “There is no reason to be concerned.”
In Lublin, Poland the Maria Curie-Skłodowska University said a supposed rise in radioactivity in the country - as highlighted by Patrushev - was a natural phenomenon linked to rainfall.
A spike in bismuth was caused by precipitation.
Independent Russian journalist Ilya Shepelin said: “At its peak, on Monday, it was….five million times lower than a life-threatening dose.”
Patrushev’s radioactive cloud threat late on Friday was mocked by the Procurator Telegram channel which ridiculed the septuagenarian as a candidate for “a medal in the field of nuclear physics”.
“Perhaps Patrushev forgot to put his glasses on, and did not see that the uranium was depleted, and therefore there was no way a radioactive cloud could come out of it,” it stated.
“In a word, the Europeans will not even notice this nightmarish threat, just like the infamous freezing [from halted gas supplies] in winter.”
Similarly, Patrushev provided no evidence for the constantly repeated Russian claim that the US is developing and deploying chemical and biological weapons in Ukraine.
In March, Russia accused Britain of triggering “genocide” by supplying Ukraine with depleted uranium tank shells.
Putin said he “will have to respond properly since the collective West will be using weapons with a nuclear component”.
Britain accused the Russians of “deliberately trying to disinform” over a “standard component and has nothing to do with nuclear weapons or capabilities”.
But Russian foreign ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova hit back declaring: “The use of ammunition with depleted uranium is a manifestation of genocide of the population against which it is used and the people who use them.”
They would cause radioactive damage to “everyone” living in the place where the depleted uranium tank shells are released.
“They receive it, and it’s not a one-time problem…they will live with this forever.”
This was a “scientifically proven fact” based on their use in former Yugoslavia, she alleged.
