Posted on 03/05/2007 7:07:51 PM PST by blam
Are Putin's agents behind shooting?
By Toby Harnden in Washington and Adrian Blomfield, Moscow Correspondent
Last Updated: 2:43am GMT 06/03/2007
Speculation of the involvement of Russian agents intent on silencing opponents to President Vladimir Putin's regime, wherever they may be, has increased with an attempted murder in America and an apparent suicide in Moscow.
Alexander Litvinenko, who died last November, was a friend of Paul Joyal
On the face of it the two incidents appear to have nothing in common, but Paul Joyal, shot in Adelphi, Maryland, on Saturday, is a friend of Alexander Litvinenko, the former Russian spy poisoned with polonium in London last year.
And in Moscow, Ivan Safronov, 51, was an ex-colonel and journalist for Kommersant who had irritated the Russian FSB security service with his frequent exposes.
He was reported dead yesterday after apparently falling from a fourth floor window of his apartment block on Friday.
The shooting of Mr Joyal, 53, was part of an apparent robbery, but law enforcement sources last night said it could merely have been a set-up. Mr Joyal, who struck up a friendship with Mr Litvinenko during visits to London, had recently told NBC's Dateline programme that the Russian's death was an act of "political retribution".
US friend of Litvinenko is shot at home
Mr Litvinenko, with whom Mr Joyal had struck up a friendship during visits to London, died last November after ingesting polonium-210, a rare radioactive isotope.
Mr Joyal told the programme: "A message has been communicated to anyone who wants to speak out against the Kremlin - 'If you do, no matter who you are, where you are, we will find you and we will silence you - in the most horrible way possible'."
Two black males were reported to have been seen fleeing the scene after Mr Joyal was shot in his driveway. Police sources said his wallet and briefcase were stolen and that his car, a Chrysler 300, was of a make commonly targeted by criminals.
Mr Kalugin, who was convicted in absentia by a Russian court five years ago of spying for the West, was telephoned by Mr Joyal's wife, Elizabeth, who told him: "Oleg, Paul is shot - I want to warn you."
Although Mr Kalugin said he did not believe there was an "international" element to the attempted murder, during the Cold War assassinations were sometimes made to look like ordinary crimes to cover the tracks of the agencies involved. On occasions, local criminals were hired.
A law enforcement source said that although the incident appeared to be a robbery, one witness heard one of the assailants say: "Just shoot him."
The source conceded that it was possible that it was an assassination designed to look like a robbery. "If I was going to do something like this then that's certainly what I would do."
Any connection between the slaying of a former government official in Washington and the Russian government or intelligence services would spark a crisis in US-Russian relations. The FBI was immediately notified of the crime because of Mr Joyal's former Senate position.
Mr Joyal has been fiercely critical of Vladimir Putin, the Russian president, for reversing democratic reforms and was urging that Senate hearings be held on the Litvinenko murder.
Kremlin critic dies in mystery fall
A journalist who had criticised the Kremlin and frequently irritated Russia's powerful intelligence services has died after falling from a fourth floor window in his apartment block.
Friends and colleagues demanded an investigation yesterday into the death of Ivan Safronov, the military affairs columnist at the Kommersant newspaper.
Russian investigators said they believed that Mr Safronov, 51, had committed suicide - an interpretation that was challenged by colleagues.
Editors at Kommersant, widely regarded as the country's most authoritative newspaper, said the manner in which Mr Safronov died pointed to foul play.
The reporter had been to a clinic, where he was being treated for an ulcer, on Friday afternoon and then stopped on the way back to buy a bag of mandarin oranges according to witnesses.
Although he lived on the second floor, the former army colonel fell from the fourth and landed on the portico above the main entrance.
"I am sure it was murder," said Ilya Bulavinov, Kommersant's deputy chief editor. "People don't commit suicide in this manner."
Two female students had heard Mr Safronov's body land and reported that he was still alive. They rang emergency services and were told to ring back in 30 minutes if the journalist was still moving. By that time he was dead.
Joyal shooting does not seem to be a professional work.
Sounds like the Dell helpdesk.
Nothing to see here. Move along.
Good grief. Is Russia a third world country or what?
No, not professional. Not many blacks working for the KGB, either. But they could have just hired a couple of local guns to do the job, as the article points out. Apparently some precedent for it.
Litvinenko was a muslim convert with ties to Chechnya.The polonium 210 poisoning was possibly a smuggling ring gone bad. Check out the Litvinenko/Bereskovsky connection and the postings going back to the incidents for great Sherlock Holmes links on:
Http://www.strata-sphere.com
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