POISONED Yulia Skripal was targeted in the Salisbury nerve agent attack just days after she gained access to a £150,000 "secret bank account", her family claim.

The money belonged to the 33-year-old's brother Alexander, who died in mysterious circumstances in St Petersburg last year.

5 Sergei Skripal and his daughter Yulia are still in hospital following the nerve agent attack Credit: Enterprise News and Pictures

Yulia was made power of attorney at the end of February - just days before she was poisoned alongside her Russian ex-spy dad Sergei.

The cash came from the sale of the house Alexander owned in the UK with ex-wife Natalia, who is the daughter of a GRU military intelligence colonel.

Natalia - now married to a tennis coach from Wales - sold the house, and paid half the sum to her ex-husband.

Sergei's niece Viktoria Skripal, 45, revealed the "secret" bank account as she prepares to meet with Yulia in Salisbury Hospital this week.

5 Yulia is said to have had access to a £150,000 bank account from the sale of brother Alexander's house (both pictured) Credit: East2west News

5 The investigations into the nerve agent attack is still continuing in Salisbury Credit: EPA

The British authorities are preparing to grant her a visa so that she can become the first family member to meet Yulia, and also see her uncle Sergei, who remains in a coma.

She said: "Nobody knows this yet.

"At the end of February, Yulia received a general power of attorney from her father Sergei in order to take ownership of a secret bank account that belonged to her late brother Alexander.

"After his divorce, his wife Natalia paid him $200,000 USD, and he kept this money. It is in a Russian bank now."

Viktoria, who lives in Yaroslavl in Russia, has spoken out about the novichok poisoning on March 4 before - raising concerns over Yulia's mysterious unnamed boyfriend, who she had intended to wed.

5 Yulia Skripal is the 33-year-old daughter of the former Russian spy Sergei Skripal Credit: AP:Associated Press

5 Police believe the pair may have been poisoned at Sergei's home Credit: Sky

She claimed Yulia was the intended target and had a bust-up with her boyfriend’s mum after he announced they planned to start a family.

The mum, who is a highly-ranked Russian security official, is said to have been furious that her son was marrying into the family of a man who betrayed 300 agents.

Natalia, now 45, is married to Welshman Wyn Lewis, a tennis coach in Cyprus and was left devastated by Alexander's death six years after they split.

He died suddenly aged 43 from reported liver problems while he was in St Petersberg last year.

Her dad - GRU colonel Gennady Grishchenko - was 66 year old Skripal's best friend before he was exposed as a "traitor" secretly spying for MI6.

Yulia is now "conscious and talking" and improving rapidly since she was found slumped on a bench alongside Sergei, 66, in Salisbury on March 4.

It is hoped Yulia will now be able to shed light on how she and dad Sergei ended up being poisoned with the potentially-deadly nerve agent.

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Investigators have so far been unable to trace their movements and the attempted assassination has sparked a diplomatic row between Britain and Russia, with Russia denying they were behind the attack.

It has since emerged cops quizzed a woman pal of Yulia after she jetted to Britain with a £1 bag of cereal for stricken spy Sergei over fears the porridge could have been poisoned.

Traces of the poison are said to have been found on the front door of Sergei’s home in Salisbury, Wilts.

Daughter of former Russian spy Sergei Skripal is getting better after spending three weeks in critical condition following nerve agent attack