If you go to the source [11] it's this: https://www.reuters.com/article/us-britain-russia-chemicalweapons-german/wests-knowledge-of-novichok-came-from-sample-s

If you go to the source [11] it's this: https://www.reuters.com/article/us-britain-russia-chemicalweapons-german/wests-knowledge-of-novichok-came-from-sample-secured-in-1990s-report-idUSKCN1IH2HC https://www.reuters.com/article/us-britain-russia-chemicalwe... Which basically says NATO countries have possible antidotes and can easily detect Novichok, not that they produce the nerve agent. (que surprised Pikachu Putin when Britain detected it almost immediately) This is ignoring the insanity of NATO poisoning a guy that may bring genuine democracy to Russia. [12] is even more dubious as it links to papers that describe methods to detect nerve agents in environments... (even though I don't like Iran, it's doubtful they would produce Russian nerve agent instead of a variant of their own, they still want to detect it if they go to war with Russia for some reason) The other option you mentioned - anti-Putin Oligarch makes even less sense... you think private individuals can synthesize nerve agent or steal it?, that's a really dangerous supposition.