When two men suspected of poisoning former Russian spy Sergei Skripal appeared on Russian television earlier this month, the bizarre interview set the stage for another round of Western-Russian accusations. Viewers around the world subsequently mocked the pair, who had quickly become the world’s most famous suspected Russian spying duo.
Their appearance comes against a backdrop of what seems to be a string of defeats in Europe for Russia’s military spy agency, the GRU, and mass expulsions of Russian diplomats and spies earlier this year shortly after the Skripal poisoning.
