The Netherlands’ claims of ‘Russian cyberattacks’ on the Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW) fits into a string of other accusations from some Western countries and testifies to a colossal smear campaign against Russia, Head of Russia’s Federation Council (upper house of parliament) Foreign Affairs Committee Konstantin Kosachev said on Thursday.

"A synchronized and unanimous reaction by the West - where in addition to the British Foreign Office, Dutch Defense Minister Ank Bijleveld and NATO Secretary General Jons Stoltenberg ‘showed up’ at the same time - confirms that what we are seeing is not a mere accident, but an episode in a massive campaign," Kosachev wrote on his Facebook page.

He believes that these accusations are aimed at justifying any hostile action against Russia. "Given the context, the fact that the name of the professional supplier of these ‘required’ fakes is the British ‘independent’ company Bellingcat, confirms the attempt to tie together anything possible into a single dossier of Russia’s fake ‘crimes’ that would justify any, even the most absurd accusations against it, and accordingly, any hostile action against it," the senator said.

He said accusations would keep mounting against Russia, which, for its part, should not "swallow these provocations".

Earlier, Dutch Defense Minister Ank Bijleveld claimed at a news conference that Dutch military intelligence and security services had allegedly foiled an attack by Russian hackers against the OPCW. She claimed that four Russians - Alexey Morenets, Yevgeny Serebryakov, Oleg Sotnikov and Alexey Minin - were involved in the incident. Bijleveld claimed that all four worked for the Main Directorate (formerly the Main Intelligence Directorate, the GRU) of Russia’s General Staff. If she is to be believed, the equipment confiscated from them was evidence that they had tried to get access to information about the Malaysian MH17 flight disaster in Ukraine.

The Dutch Defense Ministry claims that the cyberattack was carried out on April 13. All four Russian suspects were expelled on the same day.