Police study camera footage in anti-Putin spy’s death
LONDON, Nov 25: British police were studying security camera footage on Saturday after finding radioactive traces at three London locations visited by an ex-KGB spy who accused Russian President Vladimir Putin of his murder in a deathbed statement.
As British government officials gathered for another emergency meeting, known as COBRA, health officials urged people who had been to any of the places to contact them for advice.
Alexander Litvinenko died on Thursday night after a three-week illness that saw his hair fall out, his body waste away and his organs slowly fail.
In a statement read out after his death, he accused Mr Putin of what would be the Kremlin’s first political assassination in the West since the Cold War.
“You may succeed in silencing one man. But a howl of protest from around the world will reverberate, Mr Putin, in your ears for the rest of your life,” he said.
But some suggested the death was part of a plot to discredit the Kremlin, noting that Mr Litvinenko’s drawn-out death would have given him plenty of time to tell any damaging secrets he was harbouring.Police said they were continuing an intensive probe.
“We will trace possible witnesses, examine Mr Litvinenko's movements at relevant times ... There will also be an extensive examination of CCTV (closed-circuit television) footage,” said Deputy Assistant Commissioner Peter Clarke.
Traces of Polonium 210 were found at Mr Litvinenko’s home and at two other London locations he visited on the day he fell ill -- a hotel where he met another ex-KGB spy visiting from Moscow, and a sushi restaurant where he met an Italian academic.
Britain’s Health Protection Agency urged members of the public who may have been at the locations — now cordoned off — to call a telephone hotline for advice.
‘POLITICAL PROVOCATION’: The British Foreign Office said it had asked Moscow to pass on any information that might help the police inquiry.
President Vladimir Putin, meeting EU officials in Helsinki, shrugged off Mr Litvinenko’s charge.
One analyst suggested that Mr Putin himself was the target of the plot. “Litvinenko had all the time in the world, knowing he was dying, to tell everything he knew. If they wanted him dead they would have used cyanide or ricin,” Eric Kraus, a Russian commentator, told Sky News.
“It should be very clear that the net effect of this is to damage Russia. Who wishes to damage Russian interests? The exiled oligarchy in London, who for the last six or seven years have run a smear campaign against the Russian government.”
Alexander Goldfarb, a Russian dissident and close friend of Mr Litvinenko, responded: “This smacks to me of a classic KGB disinformation campaign to cover up their tracks. The thing which implicates the Kremlin is the poison.”
The use of such a rare radioactive isotope — which can be made only in a nuclear reactor — suggested to experts that only a very sophisticated organisation, if not a powerful state, could be behind the crime.
“This is not some random killing. This is not a tool chosen by a group of amateurs. These people had some serious resources behind them,” Dr Andrea Sella, lecturer in chemistry at University College, London, said.—Reuters
