Sergei Skripal’s mother dreams of holding her beloved son one more time – unaware of the full horror of his novichok poisoning by Vladimir Putin’s henchmen.
Standing up to shake my hand, the 90-year-old spoke clearly and firmly.
Distraught Yelena is upset that Sergei and granddaughter Yulia have not been back in touch, as they promised in a phone call out of the blue on her 90th birthday this summer.
Talking to the Daily Mirror in her first interview at her apartment, 185 miles from Moscow in Yaroslavl, she said: “I just want to see and hold my son again for one more time.
“I want to hug him. I miss him so much. My eldest son is dead. Sergei is the only son I have left and I love him.” Yelena is well aware her son is a convicted spy and has been very ill.
She believes he is in England, but family members have decided to protect her from the full details about the poison plot.
On the walls of her immaculately kept room are several photos of her family, including several of her son.
She said: “I know he moved to England and lives in a place called Salisbury now.
“I must admit I had never heard of it before.”
Sergei, No1 on the Russian president’s hit list, knows that calling Yelena might give away his safe house.
He and Yulia have vanished off the face of the earth and are now being protected at all costs since their remarkable recovery from the novichok poisoning – in a huge joint UK-US operation.
Putin has branded Sergei “a traitor” after the former Colonel was caught spying for the West.
Yelena added: “The last time I actually spoke to Yulia was on the 24th of July on my 90th birthday.
“She rang – it was unexpected but it was so lovely to hear from her. She called and was actually with Sergei.
“She told me: ‘I’m with daddy he is beside me but he can’t speak as he has a pain in his throat’. She said he had been in some pain.
“I was so sorry not to be able to speak to him, even for a short while.
“But I’m so pleased that they were together on my birthday.
“We used to speak on the phone every single week.
“I’m now applying for a passport to go to England to see him but I don’t think they will give me one.
“But I dream of getting to England to see them. I’m glad he has got better.
“It certainly was a worrying time.”
Sergei, 67, and Yulia, 32, almost died after being poisoned with novichok in March, allegedly by Russian agents.
It wasn’t until May 18, two months after the attack, that Sergei was finally discharged from hospital.
The next month Dawn Sturgess and Charlie Rowley were also poisoned by novichok they found in a perfume bottle in a park litter bin.
They were taken to hospital but Dawn died two weeks before Yulia made her birthday call to Yelena.
Since that solitary conversation, Yelena has heard nothing of Sergei and Yulia’s whereabouts and is unaware that they might since have left the UK. Their protection is being masterminded by UK and US agencies who are desperate to keep them safe.
If they make regular calls to Yelena they fear Russian authorities could track them down.
But nobody, it seems, can reveal this to Yelena, an elegant, intelligent and well spoken woman.
In her working life she was a high-powered PA for one of the top politicians in the Kaliningrad region, to the north-east of Poland.
She sat in her green patterned dressing gown, wearing black socks adorned with love hearts, as she spoke about her lost loved ones.
Using a walking frame she moved slowly from her bed to sit on a red sofa to speak of her son. “I know that Yulia – who really is a lovely granddaughter – went to visit him in England.
“They promised to call me back but unfortunately they haven’t.” Yelena has her niece Viktoria and family for company and shares her first floor apartment with them. They constantly pop in and out of her room and it’s clear they are very close.
Yelena gave birth to Sergei in Kaliningrad in 1951. But the family decided to move to Russia “proper” for a better life. Yelena remembers the date well.
“It was 27 March, 1987 when we moved from Kaliningrad,” she said. “It was a new start for our family.” Sergei then went to work for the feared GRU military intelligence division and moved to Moscow.
It’s clear that he was a much-loved and highly respected son even after his fall from grace.
Despite Putin’s view of her son, Yelena said: “I’m so proud of what Sergei achieved in his life.
“For many years he used to live and work in Moscow and I often went down to visit him and his family.
“When he was swapped between Russia and the US I had a heart attack and doctors told me I couldn’t travel.
“I’ve always regretted that.”
As she sat chatting, she patted her pet cat called Silver, an 11-year-old Persian. Above her bed are two religious icons Sergei brought back from Spain for her.
On the wall opposite are two more icons given to her by her beloved daughter-in-law Ludmilla a year before she died.
“She knew she was dying but wanted me to have them,” smiled Yelena. “They are very special.”
She added: “My son is a good man, a decent man, an honourable man –Russia should be proud of him. He was a great servant of his country. He was always a decent boy – he worked hard at his studies.
“His first posting away was in Malta where he lived for six years and then he came back to Moscow for two years. He was then posted to work in Spain with his family.”
She wistfully recalled their last meeting after the death of her husband.
She said: “The last time I saw him was on September 25, 2004. It was his father’s funeral. I remember it well. It was a such a sad occasion – I had no idea that would be the last time I would ever hold my son.”
There was worldwide outrage after it was revealed the two men suspected of carrying out the novichok attack worked for the GRU.
Russia was ridiculed worldwide for claiming they were sightseeing and had nothing to do with the plot to kill the Skripals.
The potential assassins were later identified as military doctor Alexander Mishkin and Col Anatoliy Chepiga.
Mishkin is from a tiny village called Loyga, 1000 miles from Moscow.
Chepiga is from Beryozovka, about 5,000 miles from Moscow on the Russia/China border.
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