Posted on 11/25/2006 12:59:26 PM PST by GarySpFc
The death bed statement by Alexander Litvinenko blamed Russian President Vladimir Putin for the poison he believes took his life. But will we ever know with certainty who was responsible?
While the Health Protection Agency says Mr Litvinenko was poisoned with the radioactive substance polonium-210, the question of who was responsible persists.
The former spy's two meetings in central London on 1 November, in Piccadilly and Mayfair, may hold the key to the identity of his killer.
The former KGB agent made enemies Friends of the 43-year-old have blamed the Russian security service (FSB), as Mr Litvinenko accused it of many abuses, including the bombing of a block of flats in 1999, killing 300 people.
Others had linked his sickness directly to another focus of his criticisms, former KGB agent Putin.
Any involvement has been dismissed by the Kremlin as "nonsense", a sentiment echoed by Russia's foreign intelligence service.
The matter is now in the hands of Scotland Yard, which is investigating the case as an "unexplained death".
Security analyst Glenmore Trenear-Harvey, who met Mr Litvinenko several times, said the media focus on the Kremlin was "lazy" and bore the hallmarks of a John Le Carre novel.
"We have to put this in a historical context," he said.
"Litvinenko's last job within the FSB was heading up the anti-corruption unit and he discovered a lot of corruption there and made a lot of enemies within the KGB."
When Yeltsin broke the KGB into different agencies such as the FSB and the SVR, the majority of its members stayed on but some went into the Duma and a third group went into legitimate business, he said.
But a "murky bunch" went into what was known as the Russian mafia.
Sophisticated poison
"My own belief, and this is speculation, is that it's not inconceivable that Anna Politkovskaya in her search for murderers within the Russian bank system discovered the contract killings were these former KGB people.
"She was killed and if Litvinenko indeed was privy to her investigations then it could well be that they will emerge as his killers."
Although the sophisticated nature of the poison suggested it could have come from the state, there was no motive, he said.
The case has caused huge interest in the UK "There was no benefit to Putin or Russian intelligence services to have a highly publicised operation like this."
And despite the continued claims linking Putin, diplomatic relationships between the UK and Russia were unlikely to be affected, he said.
Alex Pravda, an expert in Russia foreign policy and a member of international analysis organisation Chatham House, believes it is too early to say who was responsible.
"There's a lack of clarity in all this. It's a matter of speculation and I think we have to wait until there's better evidence," he said.
And the lack of coordination between Russian government and other agencies made it difficult to point the finger with any certainty, he said.
What has characterised the Litvinenko case from the start has been the way one explanation has been quickly replaced by another.
It was thallium. No, it was radioactive thallium. No, it was a cocktail of drugs. No, it was a mystery object. Now polonium-210 has been identifed.
Given the days of uncertainty about what killed him, the matter of who killed him may never be resolved.
Former KGB spy unbowed in criticism 2006/11
By JENNIFER QUINN, Associated Press Writer 11 minutes ago
LONDON - Before his death, former spy Alexander Litvinenko was unbowed in criticizing alleged abuses by his homeland‘s government and relentlessly pursued information about the death of an investigative journalist who also had challenged President Vladimir Putin ‘s regime.
In an interview conducted hours before he lost consciousness Tuesday — two days before his death from radiation poisoning — Litvinenko acknowledged fearing he would die, and claimed the Kremlin was directly involved in his illness.
Just weeks before, on Oct. 19, Litvinenko was in the audience during a media discussion at the Frontline Club for journalists.
"My name is Alexander Litvinenko, and I am a former KGB and FSB agent," he said, referring to the Russian initials of the former Soviet secret service and its successor, Russia‘s Federal Security Service. The audience murmured and twisted in their chairs to watch the sandy-haired, stylish man.
"Somebody has asked me directly who is guilty of Anna‘s death? And I can directly answer you: It is Mr. Putin, president of the Russian Federation," Litvinenko said.
Litvinenko joined the Russian counterintelligence forces in 1988 and rose to the rank of colonel in the Federal Security Service. He began specializing in terrorism and organized crime in 1991, then was transferred to the agency‘s most secretive department on criminal organizations in 1997.
Following his public claim, Litvinenko spend nine months in jail the following year on charges of abuse of office. He was later acquitted, and moved to in 2000 to London, where he received asylum and later became a British citizen.
His 2003 book, "The FSB Blows Up Russia," accused the security agency of staging bombings at Russian apartment buildings in 1999 that killed more than 300 people and were blamed by the Kremlin on Chechen separatists. The bombings were followed by the second war in a decade in Chechnya , a predominantly Muslim region in southern Russia.
I'd believe the dead guy over Putin myself.
You can give up on Gary - he'll never admit that the main suspects are KGB thugs
http://www.theaustralian.news.com.au/wireless/story/0,8262,4-20812178,00.html
Unfortunately, I do not have your certitude, but will wait for the evidence. I do have an opinion, but then again it likely will not be the one you want to hear.
Hell hath no fury like a superpower scorned.
It does not take much to figure out that KGB Putin is eliminating all his prominent Russian critics, one after the other. The question is, whose next, and will these assassinations remain only Russians exposing the Kremlin ruler's ruthless reign?
I am not a cynic and I hope you are right.
Sorry. I misunderstood your post. I thought you were saying that either this guy's death or the Russian "footprint" on the world right now re terrorism and domination WOULD garner a serious and measured reaction from the West. I didn't get that you were going a little deeper! :)
my gut tells me different than most here,my gut says it is old USSR types throwing Pootie Poot under the bus so as not to get too comfy with America and are leading insurgents willingly and unwillingly.
Keep an eye on Berezovsky.
ditto Berezovsky and on this post you made my point.............touche'
If killing dissidents is condoned in the Russian Orthodox Church, than I will believe you.
I am a Christian. You are a conspiracy theorist, which is a complete denial the Lord was responsible for the fall of the Iron Curtain. We might as well be on different planets..
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