Metabiota’s senior microbiologist and laboratory start-up coordinator between 2006 and 2016 according to the Telegraph. He previously spent 20 years in the US Navy, where he worked as a research microbiologist and head of the Navy’s Threat Assessment Department. According to his CV, Thornton did his work at secret facilities, including one in Cairo, Egypt, and “conducted research on disease agents of military relevance, especially enteric pathogens.” In Ukraine, Thornton advised local staff on highly dangerous pathogens as well as other epidemic disease related issues in DTRA projects, and coordinated the upgrade of reference laboratories in Ukraine to biosafety level 3 (BSL-3), which are used to study infectious agents or toxins that may be transmitted through the air and cause potentially lethal infections.
Thornton “provided advice to local personnel regarding the handling of high-threat pathogens under the DTRA’s Ukrainian projects”, according to Russian spokesman Igor Kirillov. “The obtained evidence indicates the direct involvement of the US Department of Defense and of its contractors in planning and implementing the Pentagon’s projects in Ukraine. We believe that the aforesaid executives are obliged to answer questions concerning the real purpose of these works,” Kirillov said.
