Sergei Scripal

Russian Prime Minister Dmitry Medvedev will be on an official visit to Bulgaria on March 4-5 at the invitation of his Bulgarian counterpart Boyko Borisov, the government information service announced on Monday.

The visit will begin a day after Bulgaria's National Holiday - March 3rd.

British and Bulgarian officials will jointly investigate whether there is a link between the poisoning of Russian spy Sergei Scripal in Salisbury and Bulgarian businessman Emilian Gebrev in Sofia. This was made clear after a meeting of British Ambassador Emma Hopkins with Prime Minister Boyko Borissov, Chief Prosecutor Sotir Tsatsarov and Interior Minister Mladen Marinov.

Prime Minister Boyko Borissov met with British Ambassador Emma Hopkins, reported the Bulgarian National Television. 

They discussed information about the possible poisoning of businessman Emilian Gebrev and a link to the Scripal case.

Emilian Gebrev, army merchant, enters the Special Services Control Commission days after posting on British and Russian sites.

Austria is ready to become a mediator to settle disagreements between the UK and Russia over the Sergei Skripal case. This was announced by Foreign Minister Karin Kneissl, quoted by TASS.

"We are open to everyone, and if we are to ask for mediation efforts (between Russia and the UK), we are happy and ready for that," said Kneissl, in front of the Austrian TV channel OER Ef 2.

Britain and the Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW) have not yet presented 100% evidence of Russian involvement in the poisoning of Sergei Scripal. For this reason, Austria will currently refrain from expelling Russian diplomats. This was stated by Austrian Foreign Minister Karin Kneissl.

While there is a "high probability", but there is no hard evidence, we can not discuss the recall of Bulgarian diplomats from Russia.

Russia announced that 23 British diplomats are now "persona non grata" and gave them a week to leave the country and also to close the British General Consulate in St. Petersburg, FOCUS quoted TASS as saying.

Britain expels 23 Russian diplomats who have a week to leave the country, British Prime Minister Theresa May said in a speech to parliament, CNN quoted her as saying.