Charlie Rowley says he views Russia as responsible and some of what diplomat said was ‘ridiculous’

The partner of Dawn Sturgess, the woman who died after last year’s novichok poisonings, has said he still believes Russia was responsible for the attack, after meeting the country’s ambassador in London.

Charlie Rowley, who was also exposed to the nerve agent used to attack the former spy Sergei Skripal and his daughter, Yulia, in Salisbury last March, said he “didn’t really get any answers” after meeting the Russian ambassador to the UK, Alexander Yakovenko.

Yakovenko had seemed “genuinely concerned” about his situation when they met at the Russian embassy in Kensington, Rowley told the Sunday Mirror, but it had not changed his view on Russia’s involvement.

Rowley and Sturgess, a mother of three, fell ill in Amesbury after coming into contact with a perfume bottle believed to have been used in the poisonings of the Skripals months earlier. Sturgess died in hospital in July.

“I went along to ask them: ‘Why did your country kill my girlfriend?’ but I didn’t really get any answers,” Rowley said. “I liked the ambassador but I thought some of what he said trying to justify Russia not being responsible was ridiculous. I’m glad I met him and feel I did find out some things I didn’t know before. But I still think Russia carried out the attack.”

Quick guide What is novichok? Show Hide Novichok refers to a group of nerve agents developed by the Soviet Union in the 1970s and 80s to elude international restrictions on chemical weapons. Like other nerve agents, they are organophosphate compounds, but the chemicals used to make them, and their final structures, are considered classified in the UK, the US and other countries. The most potent of the novichok substances are considered to be more lethal than VX, the most deadly of the familiar nerve agents, which include sarin, tabun and soman. Novichok agents work in a similar way, by massively over-stimulating muscles and glands. Treatment for novichok exposure would be the same as for other nerve agents, namely with atropine, diazepam and potentially drugs called oximes. The chemical structures of novichok agents were made public in 2008 by Vil Mirzayanov, a former Russian scientist living in the US, but the structures have never been publicly confirmed. It is thought they can be made in different forms, including as a dust aerosol. The novichoks are known as binary agents because they only become lethal after mixing two otherwise harmless components. According to Mirzayanov, they are 10 to 100 times more toxic than conventional nerve agents. Photograph: Matt Cardy/Getty Images Europe

The 45-year-old, who continues to suffer from the long-term effects of exposure to novichok, said he had asked the ambassador “more than a dozen questions in all”, including asking him about his claims that Britain was behind the attack.

Yakovenko was said to have told him the substance used did not come from Russia and that the country had only small amounts of novichok.

Yakovenko told the Sunday Mirror that he and Rowley were “on the same page” and wanted to see a report on the investigation published.

“It is important for Russia, but also for Charlie Rowley,” he said. “I’ve seen a normal person who has really suffered a lot and who has suffered a tragedy in his life. If he asked for it, I would give him support.”

Police investigating the Salisbury poisonings made a fresh appeal for information last week, as the government announced that the decontamination of 12 sites cordoned off after the attack had been completed.

The British government has identified two suspects as officers from Russia’s military intelligence agency, the GRU. Scotland Yard and the Crown Prosecution Service said in September that there was sufficient evidence to charge the two Russians – known by their aliases Alexander Petrov and Ruslan Boshirov – with offences including conspiracy to murder.

Counter-terrorism officers have said they are still trying to find out where the perfume bottle was between the attack in March and the end of June when Rowley found it.