Leading Russian critic of Putin's regime is poisoned in London

The Telegraph ^ | 11/19/06 | Andrew Alderson, Chief Reporter and James Glover

[bruinbirdman]

Scotland Yard has launched an investigation into an audacious attempt to murder – using a deadly poison – a leading Russian defector at a restaurant in London.

Alexander Litvinenko, a former colonel in the Russian secret service and a fierce critic of President Vladimir Putin, was seriously ill under armed guard at a London hospital last night.

Alexander Litvinenko defected
to Britain six years ago

A close friend of Mr Litvinenko said last night: "Alexander has no doubt that he was poisoned at the instigation of the Russian government." He has been living at a secret address in London with his wife and son because he feared he might be targeted by political opponents.

Mr Litvinenko is thought to have been poisoned with thallium, a colourless and odourless liquid that is often used to kill rats. It has been used in previous murder attempts of political opponents.

Sources close to the investigation said last night that the poison has attacked Mr Litvinenko's central nervous system and there are fears that he will never make a full recovery. His condition was described last night as "serious but stable".

The crime invoked memories of the murder of Georgi Markov, 49, the prize-winning Bulgarian author and broadcaster, who was poisoned as he waited with commuters on Waterloo Bridge in 1978. Mr Markov felt a pain in his thigh and three days later he was dead: the murder weapon was an umbrella, partly developed by the KGB, which fired a pellet the size of a pinhead, containing the poison ricin.

Mr Litvinenko defected to Britain six years ago but only became a British citizen last month. He is regarded as a traitor in his native Russia and friends suspect the FSB of trying to murder him.

He went to meet the woman journalist at Itsu on November 1 after she claimed to have information about the shooting of Miss Politkovskaya, also a fierce critic of President Putin. The next day, Mr Litvinenko complained of feeling unwell and was admitted to hospital. It was thought he had nothing more than a serious stomach upset but in recent days his condition has deteriorated. Friends say the journalist may have been a genuine contact but that political opponents may have discovered the venue for their meeting and slipped the poison into his meal or drink.

Tatiane Assis, the manager of Itsu, said that two detectives visited the restaurant yesterday. "They asked if we had CCTV. We said we didn't and they left without explaining why they had called." There is no suggestion that the restaurant, or its staff, had anything to do with the poisoning.

[WestVirginiaRebel]

"Are you talking to me? Are you talking to me? You must be, because I just told the KGB where you live."

[potlatch]

Putin put on a very good act for all of us when he was here, visiting with school children, wearing his Mother's cross, etc!

[M. Espinola]

"This, wrote Migranyan, would ensure Putin's "dominating influence in Russian political life," given that he would retain control of the government and the parliament while putting a loyalist in the Kremlin."

Putin is strategically grooming himself, coupled with his old KGB cronies, for the second reign of Uncle Joe and the West is acting like it's 1938 all over again, in terms of letting this vulture get away with murder.

Putin's expanding natural gas empire in that of Gazprom currently controls 25 percent of nearly one third of the world's total of proven reserves. That's a lot of potential blackmail especially direct against former Soviet captive nations that are demanding Russia stay out of their internal affairs.

[NotJustAnotherPrettyFace]

"Arkancide" in London?!

[bruinbirdman]

"Putin will be out of office soon. "

American Foreign Policy Council

A glimpse into Putin's post-presidency plans;

Russian President Vladimir Putin has indicated he will retain influence after he steps down in 2008, Reuters reports. Speaking during a live TV phone-in interview, Putin reiterated his commitment not to amend the country’s constitution to stay on for a third term. At the same time, however, he added: “Even after I no longer have presidential powers I think that... I will be able to preserve the most important thing that is dear to any politician: your trust. Using this, we can together influence life in our country and guarantee that it develops in a continuous manner.”

Andranik Migranyan, the renowned political scientist who heads the Public Chamber’s commission on overall national strategy, wrote in Izvestia on October 10th that Putin could “remain in power” after 2008 if he becomes head of the United Russia party, becomes prime minister after the party’s likely victory in the 2007 parliamentary elections and then picks “a person who is personally dependent on him and does not have his own political, financial, or information base” as United Russia’s candidate for the 2008 presidential election. This, wrote Migranyan, would ensure Putin’s “dominating influence in Russian political life,” given that he would retain control of the government and the parliament while putting a loyalist in the Kremlin.

----------------------------------

yitbos

[M. Espinola]

Oooppps..:)

[bruinbirdman]

"Putin is strategically grooming himself, coupled with his old KGB cronies, for the second reign of Uncle Joe and the West is acting like it's 1938 all over again, in terms of letting this vulture get away with murder."

Not to worry. I understand Germany is doing deals with the Rooskies. Big deals and pacts.

In another four years Germany will have a final solution for the Rooskies. Like in the old days. Socialist buddies always get along.

yitbos

[AdmSmith]

Do you have any additional info in Polish newspapers?

[PGalt]

BTTT

[PGalt]

"Does Vlady look like young David McCallum back in da day"

Speaking of Hollywood...

http://debbieschlussel.com/

scroll down to 3rd topic

[Osage Orange]

I dunno....cause the Clinton's "friends" just kill themselves...by jumping off buildings, crashing their planes, wrecking their cars, eating their guns, having strokes & heart attacks etc..etc.....

Funny thing is their cat's kill themselves...too so it's probably something in the H20.

Not really the same....

[lizol]

No.
This is the first time I see anything about this.

[Darnright]

>Does Vlady look like young David McCallum back in da day<

My thoughts exactly. They could be brothers.

[AdmSmith]

Maybe it is worth some recycled electrons for the ping list?

[AdmSmith]

Alexander Litvinenko, the former Russian security agent fighting for his life in a UK hospital after allegedly being poisoned, has been a fierce critic of Vladimir Putin since before he became president in 2000.

Mr Litvinenko is thought to have been close to journalist Anna Politkovskaya, another opponent of the Kremlin who was shot dead last month, and said recently he was investigating her murder.

It was after being handed documents apparently relating to the case that he was taken ill more than two weeks ago.

But he is perhaps best known for a book in which he alleges that agents co-ordinated the 1999 apartment block bombings in Russia that killed more than 300 people.

He now appears to have fallen victim to the kind of plots which he wrote about.

Arrest

Mr Litvinenko, 43, first became a security agent under the Soviet-era KGB, rising to the rank of lieutenant-colonel in its later incarnations.

He is reported to have fallen out with Vladimir Putin, then head of the security service, in the late 1990s, after failing in attempts to crack down on corruption within the organisation.

In 1998, he first came to prominence by exposing an alleged plot to assassinate the then powerful tycoon Boris Berezovsky, who himself now lives in self-imposed exile in the UK.

He was subsequently arrested on charges of abusing his office and spent nine months in a remand centre before being acquitted.

In 1999 he wrote Blowing up Russia: Terror from Within, in which he accused the current Russian security service, the FSB, of carrying out several apartment house bombings in 1999 that killed more than 300 people.

The attacks, which Moscow blamed on Chechen rebels, helped swing public opinion behind Russia's second war in the breakaway republic.


Petrol bombs

Complaining of persecution, in 2000 Mr Litvinenko fled to the UK where he sought, and was granted, asylum.

But after settling in an unnamed London suburb, the former spy continued to behave as if on the run, constantly changing his contact details.

The Times newspaper reported that over the summer someone tried to push a pram loaded with petrol bombs at his front door.

Appearing alongside high-profile opponents of President Putin, he has continued to make allegations about his former bosses.

Perhaps most notably, he alleged that al-Qaeda number two Ayman al-Zawahiri was trained by the FSB in Dagestan in the years before 9/11.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/6163502.stm

[oldfart]

Clinton's reign was marked by similar occurances. There used to be a list on the net with names of dozens of people who were opposed to the Clinton policies and who committed "suicide." If I remember correctly, one even cut his own head off and placed it in a separate garbage container than the one he left his body in.
We certainly live in interesting times.

[lizol]

Eastern European ping list

---

FRmail me to be added or removed from this Eastern European ping list

[Thunder90]

Russia/Soviet/Coldwar2 PING!!!

to be added or removed from this list, please FReepmail me!!!

[MelonFarmerJ]

Phooey. I do my best work with a stogie and a big beer. Have to post with one hand, though, makes for plenty typosofw^f4f492fj#&^00.........

[Enterprise]

LOL - Nothing like a cigar and a beer to sharpen up the intellect.