The two men suspected of using a nerve agent to poison a turncoat Russian spy and his daughter denied the allegations on Thursday, claiming they were simply on a sightseeing tour in England.

Ruslan Boshirov and Alexander Petrov made their first public appearance in an interview with the Kremlin-funded TV station RT to discuss their March visit to the southern English city of Salisbury.

“Our friends had been suggesting for a long time that we visit this wonderful town,” Petrov said, according to the Guardian. 

Boshirov claimed the two were there to take in the sights of the “famous Salisbury Cathedral.”

“It’s famous for its 123-meter spire, it’s famous for its clock, the first one [of its kind] ever created in the world, which is still working,” he said.

The pair said they spent time in Salisbury on March 3 and 4. British police have said their first short visit was meant to stake out the area.

Petrov, though, had a different explanation.

“We arrived in Salisbury on 3 March and tried to walk through the town, but we lasted for only half an hour because it was covered in snow,” he said. “We specifically went there [again] to see the Old Sarum, Stonehenge and the cathedral and decided to finish this thing on 4 March.”

The two Russians – identified by British authorities as military-intelligence officers – were charged last week in the UK of trying to murder Sergei Skripal by allegedly spraying his front door with the deadly nerve agent Novichok.

The attack left Skripal and his daughter, Yulia, hospitalized after they were found unconscious on a park bench in Salisbury.

Petrov and Boshirov allegedly used a perfume bottle with an extra-long nozzle to spray the door – a claim Boshirov dismissed as “silly.”

“The customs are checking everything, they would have questions as to why men have women’s perfume in their luggage,” he said. “We didn’t have it.”

RT editor Margarita Simonyan, who conducted the interview, suggested that Boshirov and Petrov were gay because of security footage that constantly shows them side by side.

“All footage features you two together,” she said. “What do you have in common that you spend so much time together?”

They didn’t answer but Simonyan later tweeted, “I don’t know if they’re gay or not. They’re fashionable guys, as far as I can tell, with fancy beards and haircuts, tight pants, biceps bulging under their sweaters. They didn’t hit on me, but I’m past that age.”
A spokesman for the British government insisted that they have the right guys.

“The government is clear these men are officers of the Russian military intelligence service – the GRU – who used a devastatingly toxic, illegal chemical weapon on the streets of our country,” he said. “We have repeatedly asked Russia to account for what happened in Salisbury in March. Today – just as we have seen throughout – they have responded with obfuscation and lies.”