Salisbury nerve agent attack bench cut away and removed

The bench that Sergei and Yulia Skripal were sitting on when they were discovered unresponsive has been wrapped in plastic, cut from the ground and put in the back of a van.

It was taken away from outside the Maltings shopping centre in Salisbury to preserve as a "potential crime exhibit" into the attempted murders of the former spy and his daughter.

Police in chemical suits used an angle grinder power tool and crowbar to remove it from the ground.

It was first wrapped in clear plastic film and then covered with a blue bag, before three people hauled it into the back of a van.

The Skripals were found on the bench earlier this month, with UK tests concluding they were poisoned by a novichok-class nerve agent.

:: 'I helped make nerve agent novichok'

Britain has said the Russian state directed the attack - a view that the EU and the US have said they share.

Russia and President Putin vehemently denied the claims, leading to an ill-tempered war of words that has seen dozens of diplomats expelled and the EU withdraw its ambassador to Moscow.

The boss of the Government's Porton Down defence laboratory, which analysed the nerve agent, has also dismissed Russian suggestions that the deadly substance may have originated from there.

"We have got the highest levels of controls, of security around the work that we do here," said Gary Aitkenhead.

"We would not be allowed to operate if we had lack of control that could result in anything leaving the four walls of our facility here.

"We have got complete confidence that there is nothing that could have come from here out into the wider world."

Police in the UK say that 250 counter-terror experts continue to work around the clock on the case in Salisbury.

:: LIVE: Action against Russia is 'unprecedented' - Tusk

They are being supported by international chemical weapons experts who are taking samples from the scene - and blood from the Skripals - in order to check the UK's claim that novichok was to blame.

The police officer who fell ill after being one of the first on the scene was discharged from hospital on Thursday.

However, Sergei and Yulia Skripal remain in a serious condition.

The Court of Protection, which gave permission for their blood to be taken for tests, said it is unclear whether they will recover, and if they do their mental capacity could be affected to an unknown degree.