The judge said that Putin was likely involved in the murder of Litvinenko. British court named Andrey Lugovoy and Dmitry Kovtun as the likely murderers of Alexander Litvinenko British court decision in the Litvinenko case
London High Court Judge Sir Robert Owen ruled today in the Litvinenko case, finding Andrei Lugovoi and Dmitry Kovtun guilty of his murder. The Insider cites some excerpts from the 300-page court decision that may be of public interest:
On the connection between Putin and Patrushev with drug trafficking
Litvinenko, he was convinced that there was collusion between the Tambov group and top KGB officials, including Vladimir Putin and Nikolai Patrushev.
Alexander Litvinenko simultaneously worked in the departments of economic security and organized crime. The first case he took on was the investigation of the activities of the Tambov criminal group. The organized crime group was founded in St. Petersburg, it was led by a certain Vladimir Kumarin, also known as Barsukov, and another person named Alexander Malyshev. During the course of the investigation, Litvinenko uncovered evidence that the Tambov Group was smuggling heroin from Afghanistan through Uzbekistan and St. Petersburg into Western Europe. More importantly, he became convinced that there was collusion between the Tambov group and senior KGB officials, including Vladimir Putin and Nikolai Patrushev.
This became the focus of Litvinenko's attention. Over the following years, he did not stop trying to find out and present to the public the links between the KGB / FSB and organized crime - both before and after he left Russia. After he moved to the UK, he reported the results of his investigation in the book The Gang from Lubyanka, as well as in the short essay The Uzbek Trace.
About Kuchma's wiretaps and Putin's connections with the Tambov organized criminal group
There are clear indications that Litvinenko played an important, albeit not central, role in orchestrating the recording and publication of what is being called
"Melnichenko's films". This is a recording of wiretapped conversations between Leonid Kuchma, who was then President of Ukraine, and other persons. All conversations were secretly recorded by Kuchma's bodyguard Nikolai Melnichenko. Boris Berezovsky sponsored the transcription of these recordings. From 2002 to 2005, the decryption work was carried out in London. Although Litvinenko himself was not involved in this process, he met and became close to Mr Melnichenko and a man named Yuri Shvets, who had come to London from the US to work on the records. Witness Felshtinsky reported that he was also involved in the Melnichenko tape project.
According to Goldfarb, one of the reasons for Litvinenko's interest in the "Melnichenko tapes" was the opportunity to find in them "something related to the situation in Russia." We are talking about those fragments of negotiations that prove the connection of President Vladimir Putin with representatives of criminal groups, in particular, Semyon Mogilevich and the St Petersburg Real Estate Holding Company (SPAG), which conducts the "financial" affairs of the Tambov organized criminal group. Litvinenko never hid his participation in this project and the fact that he learned a lot on the topic he needed, having familiarized himself with them. Goldfarb’s testimony proves this fact: “He (Litvinenko) always gave interviews about recordings, willingly talked about SPAG and Mogilevich,” says Goldfarb.
Litvinenko conveyed to Mr. Scaramella important information about Mogilevich, which he obtained from the transcripts of the Melnichenko tapes.
According to these accounts, Mogilevich (whom Litvinenko described as a “notorious criminal terrorist”) was “on good terms with Russian President Putin and top Russian officials”; he and Putin conducted “common cases of a criminal nature”; Mogilevich sold weapons, including to al-Qaeda; and “works for a long time as an FSB agent, and all his activities, including contacts with al-Qaeda, are under the control of the FSB ... it is for this reason that the FSB hid Mogilevich from the FBI for a long time.” Litvinenko transmitted all this information by fax to the Mitrokhin Commission.
About the Spanish case
Lugovoy claimed that Litvinenko himself told him about cooperation with the Spanish secret services and tried to persuade him to join the work.
This information is corroborated by the testimony of Marina Litvinenko and other witnesses. Litvinenko says her husband began cooperating with the Spanish authorities in late 2004 or early 2005. According to her, he made trips to the country for contacts with special services, and at least one monetary reward for this cooperation was received on their joint bank account with her husband. According to Marina Litvinenko, her husband helped the Spanish authorities in the fight against Russian organized crime in the country. She stated that Lugovoy, at the request of Litvinenko, also began to participate in the investigation - he was supposed to accompany her husband on a trip to Spain on November 10, 2006. She does not know the details of what exactly her husband was doing: “Sasha did not tell me much, he tried to save me.”
According to Boris Berezovsky's testimony, which he gave in London in December 2006, Litvinenko also told him some details of his interaction with the Spanish side. This is a fragment of Berezovsky's testimony: “I know that he [Litvinenko] received a certain amount for his cooperation with the Spanish intelligence service. He helped them in investigating the crimes of the Russian mafia. I understand that his wife also received money. Twice in September 2006, he told me that he was working with Spanish intelligence - and assisting them in their operation to arrest the top boss of the Russian mafia in Spain, who is called Shakuro. He also mentioned that he was helping them find information about Roman Abramovich. In all likelihood, Roman should have been arrested in Spain for money laundering and fraud with land. Putin was also involved in all these deals.”
Litvinenko then admitted that he was going to testify in court about Putin's connection with the mafia.
Mr Goldfarb testified that he had two conversations with Litvinenko about his Spanish connections. In the first conversation, Litvinenko said that in 2005 he offered Trepashkin, who had just been released from prison, to move to Spain and help him establish contacts with Spanish intelligence. The second conversation, according to Goldfarb, took place in 2006. Litvinenko then admitted that he was going to testify in court about Putin's connection with the mafia.
WikiLeaks released a US diplomatic correspondence dated August 31, 2009, which contained a description of two operations codenamed Avispa and Troika. These operations were carried out by Spanish agents against Russian organized crime groups in 2005 and 2006. The dispatches quoted Litvinenko as saying that he “provided information to the secret services about the connections officials countries with the Russian mafia. The Wikileaks article states that Litvinenko "allegedly provided information about Izgulov, Zakhar Kalashov and Tariel Oniani to the Spanish government in May 2006." WikiLeaks also released cables dated February 8, 2010 online, mentioning the Spanish prosecutor José Grinda, who cites information obtained from Litvinenko: “Russian intelligence and security services ... the FSB, the SVR and the GRU control organized crime in Russia” . Grinda further writes: “I believe that this thesis (of Litvinenko) is true.”
If Litvinenko really helped the Spanish authorities (and this fact is supported by the evidence), and was going to testify about all the facts he received in court, then the purpose of this Report becomes obvious - to establish whether the murder of Litvinenko was connected with the intention to testify. Is it possible that Litvinenko was thus punished for his cooperation with the Spanish authorities and prevented him from continuing to do so.
About compromising information on the head of the Federal Drug Control Service Viktor Ivanov
Shvets argues that the transmission of Litvinenko's report on Ivanov Lugovoi was " main reason Sasha's murder.
The subject of one of Litvinenko's reports, which he prepared for Mr. Shvets, was the relationship between Putin and his close associate Viktor Ivanov. Litvinenko reported to Shvets about him in August or September 2006, and the report also included pages written by Lugovoi. The document captures Litvinenko's "extremely negative" attitude towards both Ivanov and Putin. In his opinion, the fact that Ivanov was sent to serve in Afghanistan suggests that he was a failure. The report claims that, then working in St. Petersburg (at that time - Leningrad), Ivanov organized several private enterprises and deceived the KGB authorities, informing them that these enterprises were needed for operational purposes. Around September 21, Litvinenko told Mr. Shvets that he had handed over the report to a client we know as Mr. Ettew. Mr. Attew was very pleased with the second version of the report. He told me that he thought the report was excellent and he passed it on to his clients. A few days later - Mr. Shvets believed it was probably between September 21 and September 30 - Litvinenko told Mr. Shvets that his "Russian source" had also prepared a report on Ivanov, which the client called nonsense. He added that he showed a copy of the Shvets report to a Russian source to show him how to write reports. According to Attew, Shvets' well-executed report on Ivanov led to the collapse of the deal, which his clients were counting on. He suggested that, as a result, Mr. Ivanov suffered significant financial losses. Mr Shvets gave similar evidence. That the Ivanov report reached the Kremlin via Lugovoy, and that it may have been linked to Litvinenko's death, was first publicly voiced by Shvets in an interview broadcast by BBC Radio 4 in December 2006. The transcript of the interview is attached to the file. In this interview, Mr. Shvets claims that handing over Litvinenko's report on Ivanov Lugovoi was "the main reason for Sasha's murder."
After Ivanov returned to St. Petersburg, he managed to establish close relations with the Tambov organized criminal group and its leader Vladimir Kumarin. As a result of these "dubious connections", Ivanov became the de facto owner of the port of St. Petersburg, which, according to Litvinenko, he continued to control at the time of writing in September 2006. Litvinenko argued that both Putin and his protégé Ivanov had collaborated with mobsters in St. Petersburg and that both were involved in the Colombian drug cartel and money laundering.
In the verdict on the results of the investigation into the death of Alexander Litvinenko, the London judge told how he was killed, spoke about the motives and concluded: the leadership of Russia is behind this. British politicians decide how to punish her.
What the Court Decided
On Thursday, London High Court Judge Sir Robert Owen presented his decision in the case of the death of ex-FSB officer Alexander Litvinenko. At the same time, Home Secretary Theresa May read a report on this decision in Parliament (House of Commons).
From January to July 2015, Owen held a public hearing (Public Inquiry), his goal was to establish the causes and facts of the death of Litvinenko. Prior to this, Scotland Yard was investigating the case, and since 2011, a judicial inquiry has been held in the High Court of London, which was unsuccessful. The UK sought the extradition of State Duma deputy, former FSB officer Andrei Lugovoy and businessman Dmitry Kovtun, who also previously worked for the FSB.
During the new trial, the judge interrogated several dozen witnesses and studied secret documents of the special services. It took him another six months to make a decision, which he wrote on 329 pages (published on The Litvinenko Inquiry).
Robert Owen concluded that Litvinenko's death was not an accident or suicide. “I am sure that Mr. Litvinenko did not ingest polonium-210 by accident and did not intend to commit suicide. I am sure that he was most likely deliberately poisoned, ”the judge points out in the decision.
Owen concluded that it was Lugovoy and Kovtun who added the radioactive substance to the kettle at the Pine Bar and did so with the intention of poisoning Litvinenko.
According to the judge, the entire assassination operation could have been approved by the head of the FSB, Nikolai Patrushev, and President Vladimir Putin could probably have been aware of its conduct. The judge draws this conclusion, in particular, on the basis of the testimony of witnesses - former KGB officer Yuri Shvets and Litvinenko's friend Alexander Goldfarb, who insist that everything that the Russian special services do is done with the knowledge of the top leadership. In addition, according to Shvets, Patrushev himself could not get access to polonium without the sanction of the country's leadership.
How Litvinenko was killed
Litvinenko was poisoned on November 1, 2006, exactly six years after he arrived in the UK with his wife and son on November 1, 2000.
Judge Owen suggested that the assassination plan had been developed two years earlier, in October 2004.
Litvinenko was not poisoned on the first try, the judge believes. A radioactive trace was found in a meeting room at the Erinys company, where on October 16, 2006, Litvinenko took part in a business meeting with Lugovoi and Kovtun. But Litvinenko received a lethal dose of poison only after half a month.
Secret witness D3 testified in court that Kovtun called him from Lugovoi's phone the day before the poisoning, on October 31, and said that he had "very expensive poison" and he should "add it to Litvinenko's food or drink."
On October 31 and November 1, Kovtun and Lugovoi called secret witnesses several times in Hamburg and London.
On the morning of November 1, Lugovoy called Litvinenko and asked to meet on the same day at the Pine bar, Litvinenko himself told the police, already in the hospital. According to investigators, it was there in tea former officer The FSB added a radioactive substance, the amount of which was several times higher than the lethal dose.
Litvinenko became ill that evening, and at night he sought medical help. Initially, doctors suspected thallium poisoning, and only a few hours before his death on November 23, it was determined that polonium-210 (a highly toxic substance that emits alpha particles) was the cause of the poisoning.
Millions for lawyers
Dear Harbottle & Lewis Help
The legal services of the British law firm Harbottle & Lewis, which advises the Investigative Committee on the case of the death of Alexander Litvinenko, will cost the Russian budget £ 2.065 million (about 141.9 million rubles at the average weighted exchange rate of the Central Bank for 2013-2015). Based on the payment schedule, the contract was concluded for a period from 2013 to 2016. Under the latest addendum dated 26 August, most of the payments (£1.171m) are due in 2016. The total amount of the contract was published last year on the public procurement website. On behalf of Harbottle & Lewis, the agreements were signed by the firm's partner, Luis Castellani.
Non-transparent services
The amount of £2.065 million for a four-year contract with a law firm is adequate for British realities, Vadim Klyuvgant, a former lawyer for Mikhail Khodorkovsky, told RBC in August. “The opacity of spending is outrageous state budget because the purchase does not specify specific services. In addition, it is strange that the Investigative Committee needed to cooperate with a foreign law firm, because the Investigative Committee has its own resources for expertise, which also cost budgetary funds, ”says Klyuvgant. The TFR obtained the status of an interested party in the Litvinenko case in February 2013. The investigators themselves appealed to the London court with a request to participate in the inquiry. The fact that it is Harbottle & Lewis that represents the interests of the TFR was announced during court hearings.
Why they killed
The court has indicated several possible causes on which the murder of Litvinenko was organized. He did not single out any version as the main one, but noted that all of them, to one degree or another, were the motive for the poisoning.
The first version is related to the fact that the FSB considered Litvinenko a traitor. It follows from the materials of the case that back in 2001-2002, shortly after leaving for London, former colleagues in the special services warned him that it would be better for him to return, otherwise he would face death for treason, recalling the fate of Leon Trotsky (he told about one such conversation from the words of Litvinenko on trial human rights activist Vladimir Bukovsky).
Another reason is a close relationship with Boris Berezovsky. In his testimony, Alexander Goldfarb, who knew Berezovsky closely, argued that Litvinenko took risks only because he was part of the former oligarch's entourage. The court recalled in the materials that in 2004, the houses of Litvinenko and the emissary of Chechen separatists Akhmed Zakayev, who was in contact with Berezovsky, were thrown by unknown persons with Molotov cocktails.
Another motive is the constant criticism of Vladimir Putin. In his books and other publications, the ex-KGB officer accused Putin of all possible crimes - from blowing up houses to pedophilia.
Among the possible reasons for the murder are the due diligence reports prepared by Litvinenko for private companies. Together with former KGB officer Yuri Shvets, he compiled a report on the past and connections of the head of the Federal Drug Control Service Viktor Ivanov. The document is quoted in the case file: “In the confrontation between criminal gangs, Ivanov took the side of Kumarin (the leader of the Tambov organized crime group Vladimir Barsukov (Kumarin. - RBC). The main prize in this fight was the seaport of St. Petersburg, which was used as a transshipment base for drugs from Colombia: they were transported from St. Petersburg to Western Europe. Ivanov, collaborating with a criminal group, was under the protection of Vladimir Putin, who at that time was in charge of foreign economic relations in the administration of [Anatoly] Sobchak.”
The court also took into account that Litvinenko could have been killed because of his connections with foreign intelligence services. Litvinenko's wife testified in court that her husband worked with MI5 or MI6. She believes that he was passing them information about Russian organized crime and its connections in the UK. Litvinenko also cooperated with the Italian competent authorities, handing over to them, in particular, documents concerning the authority of Semyon Mogilevich and relations with the KGB of the politician Romano Prodi.
Finally, Litvinenko could work with Spanish law enforcement agencies investigating the activities of people from the Tambov organized criminal group. Litvinenko was still in the FSB investigating the activities of the Tambovskaya gang. "Litvinenko was convinced that there was collusion between the Tambov organized crime group and KGB officers, including Vladimir Putin and Nikolai Patrushev."
What will the UK do
The parliamentarians asked the head of the British Ministry of Internal Affairs Theresa May, who presented the report, whether it is planned to introduce visa bans for those involved in the Litvinenko case. The British government intends to extradite them to the UK for further prosecution, May said. May did not support the proposals of the deputies from the opposition to form a kind of “Magnitsky list” from those suspected of involvement in the “Litvinenko case”. But she expressed confidence that the assets of the defendants in the case would be frozen.
The British Foreign Office intends to summon the Russian ambassador "in order to clarify our concerns about the results of the investigation," May said. She is sure that this matter will be discussed at the next bilateral meeting of the leaders of the two countries - David Cameron and Vladimir Putin. May herself is going to meet with Marina Litvinenko and discuss her proposals.
There is no unity within the ruling Conservative Party over the results of the investigation. Parliamentarian David Davis called the government's reaction too soft, calling for "expulsion of all Russian intelligence officers from the embassy" and financial measures against Patrushev and Putin.
But his Tory colleague Crispin Blunt said cooperation with Moscow on Syria took precedence over remarks about the Litvinenko assassination. British diplomats argue in the same vein. The Guardian reported this week that the British Foreign Office had warned the Prime Minister's office not to worsen relations with Moscow over the "Litvinenko Affair". The Foreign Office considers Russia's assistance in resolving the Syrian conflict and in approving a transitional period in the event of the departure of Bashar al-Assad to be extremely necessary, the newspaper explained.
Is there anything for the accused?
This court decision is the finale of the British investigation of the “Litvinenko case,” Alexander Goldfarb and Dmitry Gololobov are sure. “Only if the British authorities catch Lugovoi and Kovtun and bring them to London, where they put them in the dock, will there be a new trial,” Goldfarb notes. There is no absentee consideration of criminal cases in England, the source of the agency explains.
The new names that sounded in the decision of Judge Owen also cannot lead to a new investigation, Goldfarb believes. “Patrushev or the president of the country are the highest government officials, they have 100 percent immunity - they cannot be charged or declared defendants in the case,” Goldfarb points out.
“It turns out such a legal dead end, without the participation of the Russian state it is now impossible to continue the investigation, and Russia, in turn, cannot extradite Lugovoi and Kovtun, this will be a direct violation of the Constitution,” Gololobov explains.
In Russia, the Investigative Committee is also investigating the death of Litvinenko. But unidentified persons are suspects, but in addition to Litvinenko, Lugovoy and Kovtun themselves, who were in the bar and could also be poisoned with polonium-210, were recognized as victims.
The verdict does not threaten the position in the State Duma and the future career of deputy Lugovoy: colleagues from different factions supported him, and the decision of the London court was criticized. United Russia, the chairman of the security committee, Irina Yarovaya, whose deputy on the committee is Lugovoi, called the statement of the British judge not tenable "from the point of view of law and logic," and the conclusions were similar to "tales from the crypt."
“If the investigation had been objective, there could have been consequences for Lugovoy. And so it looks like anti-Russian propaganda, legally unfounded,” echoes the first deputy chairman of the Socialist-Revolutionary faction Mikhail Yemelyanov.
"The logical outcome of a quasi-judicial process"
What the Russian Foreign Ministry said
“In connection with the publication on January 21 in the UK of the report of the chairman of the so-called public inquiry into the circumstances of the death of A. Litvinenko, we are forced to state that the result of a year and a half of behind-the-scenes games chaired by a seemingly professional judge turned out to be quite expected for us. It was the logical outcome of a quasi-judicial process played out by the British courts and the executive branch for the sole purpose of vilifying Russia and its leadership.”
“We remind you that this, to put it mildly, very peculiar form of investigation, which, contrary to its name, is not transparent and public either for the Russian side or for the British public, was replete with closed meetings with the consideration of “secret” materials of the special services and the testimony of “classified” witnesses . The use of such methods of consideration of the case gives every reason to doubt the objectivity and impartiality of the announced verdict.”
“As you know, the “public inquiry” was launched after the suspension of the coroner’s inquest, which, apparently, did not give the British authorities the desired result. At the same time, the Russian Investigative Committee was forced to refuse to participate in the “public investigation” solely because of its lack of transparency and the inevitable politicization of the trial. As a result, our assumptions were fully justified.”
“By the middle of 2014, when the British Home Office decided to launch a “public investigation”, which, apparently, coincided not by chance with the aggravation of the situation in eastern Ukraine, two key witnesses died under unclear circumstances: B. Berezovsky and David West, owner of a London restaurant frequented by B. Berezovsky and A. Litvinenko and where traces of polonium were found two days before the alleged poisoning of the latter.
Do other intelligence agencies kill outside their countries
The most high-profile accusation of Russian intelligence officers of murder abroad during the years of Putin's presidency was the trial in Qatar in the case of the death of one of the leaders of the Chechen separatists, Zelimkhan Yandarbiev. He died in February 2004 in the Qatari capital Doha after a bomb exploded under the bottom of his SUV. A few days later, two Russians were detained on charges of murdering Yandarbiyev and his bodyguards, whom Moscow called intelligence officers temporarily assigned to the embassy who performed information and analytical work. The prosecution demanded the death penalty for the detainees, but the court sentenced both to life imprisonment. In December 2004, they were extradited to Russia "to serve further punishment." In Moscow, the plane with the murderers of Yandarbiev was met with a red carpet at the gangway and an impressive cortege, and the Federal Penitentiary Service did not report the place where they were serving their sentences.
Among foreign intelligence agencies, the Israeli intelligence service Mossad became most famous for the liquidation of people on the territory of other states, in particular, it publicly acknowledged the hunt for those involved in the hostage-taking of Israeli athletes during the Olympics in Munich in 1972. In 2010, after the assassination of one of the leaders of the radical Palestinian movement Hamas, Mahmoud al-Mabuh, in Dubai, the head of the local police announced the involvement in the crime of 11 persons associated with the Israeli special services and using fake passports of British citizens.
In 2011, US President Barack Obama authorized an operation by the CIA and Marine Special Forces in Pakistan that ended in the assassination of al-Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden. The Pakistani intelligence services were unaware of the operation and fighter jets flew into the air to intercept unidentified objects, which turned out to be American helicopters. The United States later denied that the purpose of the operation was specifically to kill bin Laden: CIA Director Leon Panetta argued that if bin Laden had raised his hands and surrendered, he would have been detained.
A British High Court judge named Lugovoi and Kovtun as the likely perpetrators of Litvinenko's murder. Operation 'probably approved' by Russian president, public inquiry report says
State Duma Deputy Andrey Lugovoy (Photo: RIA Novosti)
On Thursday, retired High Court Judge Sir Robert Owen announced his findings from a public inquiry into the death of former FSB officer Alexander Litvinenko.
In a report that he prepared for almost half a year, the judge concluded that the murder of Litvinenko in London was “probably approved by the gentlemen [former FSB head Nikolai] Patrushev and also President [Russian Vladimir] Putin.” This is reported by the Guardian correspondent from the court.
The judge ruled out the possibility that Mr Litvinenko had ingested radioactive polonium-210 by accident or in order to commit suicide. “I am sure that he was deliberately poisoned by third parties,” said Sir Owen. “I am sure that Mr. Lugovoi and Mr. Kovtun placed polonium-210 in a kettle at the Pine Bar in London's Millennium Hotel on 1 November 2006. I am also sure that they did it with the intention of poisoning Mr Litvinenko,” the British judge was quoted by The Telegraph as saying.
Lugovoi and Kovtun may not have known what type of poison was being used to poison Litvinenko, the judge said. “I am sure that Mr. Lugovoy and Mr. Kovtun knew that they were using a lethal poison and that they intended to kill Mr. Litvinenko. However, I do not believe that they knew exactly what chemical they were using, what its nature was and all its properties, ”The Telegraph quotes the judge.
Judge Sir Owen suggested that the plan to kill Litvinenko had been developed two years before the actual crime, in October 2004, when Lugovoi and Litvinenko last met. This meeting probably took place on the initiative of Lugovoy himself. “In this regard, I would add that there is a high probability that Mr. Lugovoy was already involved in the plan, the purpose of which was Litvinenko, he probably expected to kill him,” The Telegraph quoted the judge as saying.
The Guardian correspondent Luke Harding reports that the judge's conclusion about the "probable involvement" of Vladimir Putin is based on secret documents from British intelligence agencies - in particular, Litvinenko's former employer, British foreign intelligence MI6.
Video: RBC TV channel
The murder of Litvinenko, according to the judge, was sanctioned by the FSB. “I would add that the likelihood of this is very high,” says Sir Owen.
The investigation points to several possible reasons why Putin and the Russian leadership may have intended to kill Litvinenko. In particular, President Putin "has been repeatedly the target of public criticism [by Litvinenko] of a very personal nature." The former FSB agent, in particular, accused the head of state of pedophilia. Another “serious motive,” which Litvinenko himself called, was the country’s leadership’s belief that “he had betrayed the FSB, worked for British intelligence and was an ally of the leading opponents of the Putin regime,” according to the judge’s report, published on The Litvinenko Inquiry website.
Main version
Scotland Yard almost immediately considered the main version that polonium was added to Litvinenko's tea by former FSB colleague Andrei Lugovoy (now a State Duma deputy from the LDPR party) and businessman Dmitry Kovtun, a former GRU officer. The British side in the summer of 2007 demanded the extradition of Lugovoi and Kovtun, but was refused, as the Russian Constitution forbids the extradition of citizens to other states.
His widow insisted on a public inquiry into Litvinenko's death. The British Home Office, which at first considered the investigation inappropriate, changed its mind in the summer of 2014 (shortly after a Malaysian passenger plane was shot down over the Donbass). public the investigation is being conducted in the UK on matters of high public importance. Under the British Public Inquiry Act, he is appointed by a ministerial level official. The investigation is conducted by a commission chaired by a person with the necessary knowledge and competence, usually a judge (the commission may also consist of one chairman). During the investigation, the chairman and members of the commission have special immunity. The result of the investigation is a report (report), which presents the conclusions of the commission and makes recommendations. The chairman of the commission cannot establish someone's civil or criminal liability, as well as assign compensation.
The chairman of the commission establishes the rules for conducting an investigation, may require the participants in the process to take an oath and demand criminal liability for those who evade testifying and conceal evidence. You can appeal the investigation procedure with the Lord Chancellor (Minister of Justice).
In the Litvinenko case, retired High Court Judge Sir Robert Owen was appointed chairman of the commission. He prepared his report for almost six months.
The public investigation establishes not the guilt of Lugovoy and Kovtun, but legally significant facts regarding the death of Litvinenko, Dmitry Gololobov, the former head of the legal department of Yukos, who left for England, explained to RBC.
The case of the "Russian mafia"
Relatives of Litvinenko put forward a version that the cause of the murder was the work of the deceased with the British and Spanish intelligence services in the case of the "Russian mafia" in Spain. According to them, Litvinenko helped organize the operation to detain the "Russian mafia" in Spain. Among the detainees was subsequently businessman Gennady Petrov, whom Spanish prosecutors consider one of the leaders of the Tambov organized criminal group. The Spanish prosecutor's office accused him of legalizing criminal proceeds: according to her, Petrov bought and resold real estate.
The materials of the Spanish case, which were published in the fall of 2015 on the Open Russia website, contain numerous recordings of telephone conversations between Petrov and his assistants, in which high-ranking officials were mentioned, including Alexander Bastrykin, chairman of the TFR. Some conversations were conducted, according to the Spanish prosecutor's office, with a high-ranking FSKN officer, Nikolai Akulov.
According to The Telegraph, Litvinenko's widow Marina told reporters that she was "very satisfied that the accusations against Mr. Putin, made on his deathbed by her husband, were proven by an English court." She called on British Prime Minister David Cameron to impose personal economic sanctions and visa restrictions against "all persons named in the case, not excluding Nikolai Patrushev and Vladimir Putin," as well as to expel all Russian intelligence officers from the UK. Her proposal has also already been supported by the leader of the Liberal Democratic Party of Great Britain, Tim Farron, the British media reported.
Dr. chem. Sciences
Public hearings in the case of Alexander Litvinenko have ended in London. The trial was described as the most knowledge-intensive in the history of British justice. The final report has been published, in which Andrei Lugovoi and Dmitry Kovtun are quite definitely named as the direct perpetrators of the murder, and the Russian authorities and President Vladimir Putin personally are apparently (by all appearances) involved in this crime.
Discussions about this event continue around the world. Almost no one doubts the very fact of the crime: Litvinenko was poisoned with a radioactive isotope of polonium-210, which was delivered and mixed in drink by Lugovoi and Kovtun. The motives were debatable, as well as how much and how it is connected with the Russian state.
In Russia, where the media coverage of the process is very limited, some questions remain unclear to many people:
- to what extent the conducted studies, on which the conclusion is based, are correct, and whether another interpretation of the data obtained is allowed;
- whether the defendants themselves understood what they were dealing with;
- what does the wording “probably” mean in the accusation against the Russian authorities and how well-founded these accusations are.
We will try to clarify these issues, focusing primarily on the scientific and technical aspects of this case.
Data Britishand Russian scientists
When studying not only the final report, but also the materials submitted to the investigation, one is struck by the huge amount of work done by British specialists. Determinations of polonium radioactivity were carried out in dozens of places - thousands of measurements, many of which were verified by independent organizations using different equipment. In the event that the data was in doubt, they were rechecked.
Judge Robert Owen. Photo from bbc.co.uk
Judge Robert Owen, during the interrogation of witnesses, scrupulously analyzed any, even completely insignificant inconsistencies in the announced figures. The main part of the data was analyzed by a team of scientists led by John Harrison, a well-known and respected specialist in the field of medical radiology.
Both German and Russian scientists were involved in this work. In particular, the case file contains a report by a group of researchers from the Institute of Biophysics of the FMBA (now the center named after A.I. Burnazyan), the Institute of Geochemistry and Analytical Chemistry named after. V.I.Vernadsky RAS, Radio Institute. V. G. Khlopina.
The methodology and the conducted research are described in detail and clearly. At the conclusion of the committee Russian experts- well-known experts in this field - it is indicated that on all the things presented by D. Kovtun and on the details of his chair there are significant amounts of polonium-210, and this product is not of natural, but of technogenic origin (see Fig. 1). The traces of contamination on Kovtun's personal belongings are primary, but it is unlikely that the polonium from these items could have caused significant harm to people who came into contact with these items. The level of contamination is quite consistent with that observed in similar samples by British experts (but in the bathrooms of the rooms where Lugovoy and Kovtun stayed, and in places of poisoning, the activity of polonium was orders of magnitude higher).
Figure 1. Alpha spectrum of a sample from Kovtun's chair, containing a characteristic peak of polonium-210. Measured by Russian specialists. There are also materials from the 6th clinic of the FMBA (now also the center named after A. I. Burnazyan), where Lugovoi and Kovtun were examined, and the analyzes were provided to the British side. As a result, it was found that Kovtun's body contained 1,000 times less polonium, and Lugovoy's body 10,000 times less polonium than Litvinenko's body. These data of Russian specialists are extremely important. Proceeding from them, it is possible to refute the well-known version of the Russian prosecutor's office, the Russian media and the defendants themselves - that Lugovoy and Kovtun were contaminated with polonium from Litvinenko (see below).
The Investigative Committee of the Russian Federation involved another Russian organization in the examination - the Laboratory for the Analysis of Microparticles.
The reports of Russian scientists contain data that two weeks after Kovtun's arrival in Russia, when he entered the examination, 14 thousand Bq were washed off his hands. And the total amount of polonium inside his body was estimated by British experts based on Russian data at 4 million Bq. Litvinenko, after being poisoned on November 1, left contact traces only at the level of units, tens - up to two hundred Bq (the main activity was inside the body).
The polonium found in Kovtun and Lugovoy's bodies is not enough to pose a major threat to their lives, but too much for Litvinenko to transmit through physical contact. Such an amount could enter the organisms of Lugovoy and Kovtun only as a result of contact with the original, primary product with a high concentration of polonium.
What understood and what not understood Lugovoy and Kovtun?
This question is asked all the time. Maybe Lugovoy and Kovtun really believed that they were feeding Litvinenko vitamins? Of course, it is difficult to give an exact answer to this question, but there are indications that they generally understood what they were dealing with.
According to testimonies, Kovtun was looking for a cook who would help him poison one bad person with a very expensive poison. And Kovtun really called the cook who was recommended to him.
After all three poisoning attempts - on October 16 (Lugovoi, Kovtun), October 26–27 (Lugovoi) and November 1, 2006 (Lugovoi, Kovtun) - the remains of unused polonium were destroyed in the toilet rooms: poured into the sink, into the toilet bowl, thrown into the trash bucket, wrapped in towels and thrown into the laundry. In these places, a huge amount of polonium was found.
At the final meeting on November 1, Lugovoy and Kovtun arrived earlier and ordered tea. Apparently, they put polonium in the kettle (there were no cameras in this place). After that, they went to the toilet one by one and washed their hands - polonium was found on the dryer. Then Litvinenko came and was offered tea. The teapot was later found to contain polonium in large quantities. At the end of the meeting, Lugovoi's wife and eight-year-old son approached, and he invited him to shake Uncle Sasha's hand. Was Lugovoi ready to endanger his son's health? But Lugovoy could have been informed that the poison used was only really dangerous if ingested. Whether it is radioactive or not is irrelevant in this case.
In general, the preparation and the very execution of the assassination attempt were carried out extremely carelessly. (Kovtun later complained to his former mother-in-law: “These idiots seem to have poisoned us all” (, p. 117). He did not specify which “morons.”) The manufactured source used for poisoning was apparently placed in an insufficiently sealed capsule , the amount of polonium is clearly excessive. The people who operated with this source did it carelessly.
The remains that really needed to be destroyed (otherwise there was a chance to establish the origin of polonium) were thrown away right there, in hotels. This created a significant threat to others (for example, a towel was found in the Sheraton Park Lane Hotel, on which, after washing, polonium activity of 17 million Bq was detected only for 1 cm 2).
Perhaps they were sure that no one would find anything. But from the material of the investigation it can also be assumed that this is due to relaxation and carelessness: Lugovoi and Kovtun surprised the hotel staff with the amount of alcohol they had drunk, frilly clothes, an obvious excess of jewelry, asked the hotel administrator to recommend them a place (brothel) to have fun with girls. There is no time for accurate performance of radiochemical procedures.
When examining Litvinenko, it was found that about 4.4 billion (Bq) of polonium-210 (26.5 micrograms) got into his body orally (through the mouth), which was distributed throughout the body (while the initial amount was at least 8.3 billion Bq). The highest concentration was found in the liver and kidneys, and, for example, the urine contained about 2000 Bq / ml at the time of poisoning.
This means that in order to become contaminated with polonium from Litvinenko, Lugovoy would have to ingest about 200 ml of his urine and 2 liters of sweat. Kovtun - even more. It is clear that this is impossible. We must pay tribute to Lugovoy: in his speech on January 21, 2016, he no longer spoke about this absurd version. He said that he "had no data on who killed Litvinenko." Previously, this crime was still attributed to the "English special services", Boris Berezovsky...
What exactly was meant? Obviously, some well-equipped people (preferably in space suits) secretly obtained polonium-210 from Russia (or from some completely unknown place), poisoned Litvinenko and managed to contaminate Lugovoy and Kovtun and their numbers in such a way that it strictly followed the whole logic their actions and so as not to leave any other traces of polonium anywhere and at the same time go unnoticed. Why they used the least suitable radionuclide for this - polonium-210, which is very difficult to detect (it is recorded only on an open surface) - is completely incomprehensible.
The court, having a sufficient amount of scientific data, testimonies of witnesses, recordings from video cameras, etc., did not find any grounds for this hypothesis. It should be noted that the judge was extremely cautious in cases where the evidence was not obvious. So, Vyacheslav Sokolenko, Lugovoy's business partner, a former KGB officer who was also present in some episodes, was not charged, as were a number of other characters.
Andrei Lugovoy himself (recall, he is a member of the State Duma from the LDPR faction) connects the whole process exclusively with political motives. Earlier, answering a question about the poisoning, he spoke about the legitimacy of Russian TU bombers flying near England. Now he explains everything by the aggravated situation with Ukraine: the annexation of Crimea, the downed Malaysian Boeing, etc. Apparently, such an argument is quite attractive to the supporters of the Liberal Democratic Party.
Where lead tracesinvestigations?
Arguments that speak of the involvement of the Russian authorities are mainly related to the identified motives, which are considered in aggregate (“Litvinenko’s betrayal of the interests of the FSB; Litvinenko’s publications that are offensive to Putin; disruption of a large contract lobbied by the director of the Federal Drug Control Service Viktor Ivanov, Litvinenko's forthcoming testimony to the Spanish prosecutor's office about the Russian mafia and its connections with Russian statesmen).
According to the British side, the Russian state authorities interfered in every possible way with the investigation, did not provide the necessary data. In addition, the firm position of the Russian state to protect Lugovoy and Kovtun, providing them with material and moral benefits and legal support, even when their guilt, in fact, was no longer in doubt, speaks volumes. Russia refused to discuss the extradition of Lugovoi and Kovtun as inconsistent with the Constitution, although in other cases such a possibility existed.
We will not discuss here the extent to which these accusations are justified. However, part of the argument about the involvement of the Russian state is related to the origin of polonium, which can only be produced under state control.
The only major producer of polonium-210 has recently been and is the All-Russian Research Institute of Experimental Physics, Sarov (VNIIEF) with its Avangard production unit, and irradiation at the reactor was carried out at the Mayak p/o, Ozyorsk. The main amount of polonium produced is supplied to the USA for the manufacture of sources for removing static voltage and for some other purposes.
Where did the polonium that poisoned Litvinenko come from? The judge approached this issue very carefully and critically. He rejected the experts' argument that polonium-210 was extremely expensive for private use. In an interview with VNIIEF scientific director Academician Radiy Ilkaev, the latter named the figure of $10 million for a one-year contract. But the British investigation found that in 2006, 2500 billion Bq of polonium-210 was sold for $20,000, and this seems to be a typical commercial price for this product (, p. 226).
Thus, it turns out that the amount used for poisoning at such a price will cost only about $ 70. former chairman of the Ozero cooperative and a member of the well-known SPAG company). Of course, the production of a source prepared for use as a poison costs much more. However, the developers asked for a high price for this "very expensive poison" clearly "for conspiracy", as the well-known hero of the novel by Ilf and Petrov "The Twelve Chairs" said.
The judge also stated that it was not possible to determine the origin of polonium-210 through the purity of the product (‘fngerprint’ theory). The available amount of material and background characteristics did not allow the researchers to do this.
At the same time, he agreed with the arguments that if polonium were extracted from a huge number of sources produced in the USA, then this could not go unnoticed and it would not be possible to achieve in practice the high purity of the product that was in reality.
Finally, the question was discussed whether any other organization, except VNIIEF (Avangard), could have produced such an amount of polonium-210. This radionuclide can in principle be obtained, for example, at other reactors in Russia, India, Canada and many other places. According to experts, the production of such an industrial amount of polonium requires a special program and a reactor configured in a certain way. Nothing is known about the existence of such programs. However, here, too, the judge was extremely strict in his judgment: if this is possible in principle, then he cannot rule it out.
As a result, from a technical point of view, the Russian origin of polonium has not been strictly proven, although, apparently, this took place, and few experts doubt this.
Thus, British justice has demonstrated strictness of judgment, clarity and objectivity in this complex case.
- www.litvinenkoinquiry.org/wp-content/uploads/2015/02/lit120215.pdf, p. 192–193.
- Russian newspaper. Federal Issue No. 4240.
MOSCOW, January 21 - RIA Novosti. A British court on Thursday said Russia was to blame for the death of former FSB officer Alexander Litvinenko.
The Russian side has already stated that it does not accept the conclusions of the British court. According to Russian Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova, the investigation was non-transparent and politically biased.
Litvinenko, who fled to Britain in 2000, died in November 2006 shortly after receiving British citizenship. His health began to deteriorate after a meeting with Andrei Lugovoi and Dmitry Kovtun and a joint tea party at London's Millennium Hotel. After his death, specialists from the British Health Protection Agency claimed to have found a significant amount of radioactive polonium-210 in Litvinenko's body. The main suspect in the case is a Russian businessman and deputy Lugovoy. However, he denies the accusations against him, calling them politically motivated.
Earlier, Lugovoy said that British experts had polygraphed his testimony in Moscow in Moscow and concluded that he was not involved in this.
The court accuses Russia
British court says Litvinenko was poisoned by Lugovoi and KovtunSir Robert Owen, chairman of the public hearing into the death of ex-FSB officer Alexander Litvinenko, said he did not believe that Lugovoy and Kovtun knew exactly which chemical was being used.The British court assumes that the operation to eliminate Litvinenko was sanctioned by the Russian leadership.
"Open evidence provides strong evidence that the Russian state was responsible for Litvinenko's death," Owen said in a statement.
At the same time, the coroner claims that the operation to eliminate Litvinenko could have been carried out by the FSB.
"Taking into account all the evidence and expertise available to me, I find that the FSB operation to kill Litvinenko was possibly approved by Mr. Patrushev, as well as by President Putin," the document says.
Lugovoy and Kovtun
Names Owen and those whom he considers the direct executors of the elimination of Litvinenko. In his opinion, these are Lugovoy and Kovtun.
Owen noted that he did not believe that Lugovoi and Kovtun knew exactly which chemical was being used.
Berezovsky, organized criminal group and London have nothing to do with it
At the same time, the British coroner rejected the version of the involvement of the late businessman Boris Berezovsky in the death of Litvinenko.
“There is no evidence that Lugovoi could have acted on behalf of Berezovsky, and this hypothesis is not consistent with the actions of these people since the death of Litvinenko. Summarizing, I am quite convinced that Berezovsky was not responsible for the death of Litvinenko,” the report says.
According to Owen, Russian criminal groups are not involved in the case either. "None of the evidence suggests that Lugovoy and Kovtun were hired to assassinate Litvinenko by members of criminal gangs," his report notes.
Owen also rejected the version of involvement in the death of Litvinenko British intelligence agencies. "I am quite convinced that the British intelligence services, and therefore the British government departments in general, played no role in the death of Litvinenko," the document says.
Motives unknown
The British court was less categorical in regard to the motives for the murder.
"I believe there were several reasons for organizations and individuals in the Russian Federation who might want Litvinenko to be targeted, including killed," the coroner's report said.
He cited five alleged reasons, including that Litvinenko "was viewed as a traitor by the FSB", was linked to Berezovsky and Akhmed Zakayev, that the FSB had become aware that "he worked for British intelligence", and for information revealed by Litvinenko. The last reason the coroner called "no doubt personal antagonism between Litvinenko and Putin."
In his opinion, one or more motivations could prevail.
Where is the polonium from?
The British court does not have unequivocal data on the origin of polonium-210, which poisoned Litvinenko.
“My conclusion is that none of the theories or lines of evidence associated with the source of polonium-210 that was used to kill Litvinenko is sufficient for me to conclude without further evidence that polonium-210 must have occurred or even occurred. from Russia," Owen's report says.
At the same time, the coroner noted that the choice of the substance itself indicates the likelihood of government intervention. He did not rule out a link between polonium-210 and the Russian Avangard program. "It is also true that the Avangard program in Russia was a possible source of polonium-210," he said.
Case is closed
According to British investigators, the picture of what happened is generally clear and there is nothing more to investigate.
"I do not currently intend to reopen the proceedings, as I have considered all the issues that I was required to take into account as a coroner," Owen said.
Russian Foreign Ministry: the case is politically biased
Official Moscow reacted rather reservedly to Owen's report, noting that, in fact, they didn't expect anything else.
“There was no reason to expect that the final report of a politically biased and extremely non-transparent process, which was brought to a predetermined, “necessary” result, would suddenly turn out to be objective and impartial,” said Russian Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova.
