Alexander Litvinenko

[John Geraghty]

I found Anna Politovskayas book 'Putins Russia' in my local library today, I have begun to read it. I'm sure it will give further insight into Putins general demeanour.

The BBC featured Ms.Politofskaya'a last interview last week, it didn't seem to produce any new information, rather a rehash for a western audience, interesting nonetheless.

Developments in this case will be few and slow in coming. I, like many, have been keeping abreast of anything and everything that becomes available in this case, I do hope something comes of any investigation, though I fear, yet again, ground may only be gained through independent investigative journalism.

Fancy taking a trip to London for a bit of sleuthing John?

All the best,

John

[Bob Goodman]

When you enter this neither world up is down, white is black. An outsider can probably never really know or completely determine what is really going on. The only test you can give is, who benefits? Definitly not 100% accurate by any stretch of the imagination. One may seem to benefit in the short run only to be upended in the long run. Whereas the side it seems to hurt may ultimatly benefit by it.

I agree. There seems to be three possible motivations for the killing:

1. Litvinenko had some important evidence that he was about to disclose.

2. Litvinenko's high-profile death was a warning to others who was criticizing the Russian government.

3. Litvinenko's death was arranged so as to smear Putin or the FSB.

For political reasons I want to believe it is 1 (it gives me hope that investigative journalists have the power to uncover the corrupt behaviour of politicians) but fear it might be 2 or 3.

Thanks, John. Who knows how this will all end up playing out. I imagine there are going to be several shap curves ahead on this ride. The more I thought about the impkications of it, they seemed to indicate a win-win, a slam dunk, what are we waiting for sort of thing. The young are always hungry for action, aren't they? Fashion exists in the murky world of intelligence too. Some ways of operating are "in" for a few years and "out" for some. What goes around comes around. Like womens fashions. But, if Pat Bucancan agrees with me, I think my chances of being dead wrong just skyrocketed.

Is Putin Being Set Up?

by Patrick J. Buchanan

PARIS – Whoever poisoned Alexander Litvinenko had two goals: a long and lingering death for the KGB defector and pointing a finger of accusation for his killing right in the face of Vladimir Putin.

Which leads me to believe Putin had nothing to do with it.

In an assassination, one must ask: Cui bono? To whose benefit? Who would gain from the poisoning of Litvinenko?

Certainly not Putin. Litvinenko's death puts him, the Kremlin and the KGB, now the FSB, under suspicion of having reverted to the terror tactics of Stalin, who commissioned killers to liquidate enemies like Leon Trotsky, murdered in Mexico in 1940.

What benefit could Putin conceivably realize from the London killing of an enemy of his regime, who had just become a British citizen? Why would the Russian president, at the peak of his popularity, with his regime awash in oil revenue and himself playing a strong hand in world politics, risk a breach with every Western nation by ordering the public murder of a man who was more of a nuisance than a threat to his regime?

Litvinenko, after all, made his sensational charges against the Kremlin – that the KGB blew up the Moscow apartment buildings, not Chechen terrorists, as a casus belli for a war on Chechnya and that he had refused a KGB order to assassinate oligarch Boris Berezovsky – in the late 1990s. Of late, Litvinenko has been regarded as a less and less credible figure, with his charges of KGB involvement in 9/11 and complicity in the Danish cartoons mocking Muhammad that ignited the Muslim firestorm.

Yet, listening to some Western pundits on the BBC and Fox News, one would think Putin himself poisoned Litvinenko. Who else, they ask, could have acquired polonium-210, the rare radioactive substance used to kill Litvinenko? Who else had the motive to eliminate the ex-agent who had dedicated his life to exposing the crimes of the Kremlin?

Indeed, no sooner had Litvinenko expired than his collaborator in anti-Putin politics, Alex Goldfarb, was in front of the television cameras reading Litvinenko's deathbed statement charging Putin with murder:

"You may succeed in silencing one man, but the howl of protest from around the world will reverberate, Mr. Putin, in your ears for the rest of your life. … You may succeed in silencing me, but that silence comes at a price. You have shown yourself to be as barbaric and ruthless as your most hostile critics have claimed."

Litvinenko's statement is awfully coherent and eloquent for a man writhing in a death agony. But if he did not write it, who did? All of which leads me to conclude Putin is being set up, framed for a crime he did not commit. But then, if Putin did not order the killing, who did?

Who else could have acquired the polonium-210? Who else would kill Litvinenko to make Putin a pariah? These are the questions Scotland Yard, which also seems skeptical that Putin had a hand in this bizarre business, has begun to ask.

As the predictable effect of Litvinenko's death has been to put a cloud of suspicion over Putin and a chill over Russian relations with the West, one must ask: To whose benefit is the discrediting of Putin? Who would seek a renewal of the Cold War?

Certainly, the oligarchs and robber barons like Berezovsky – many of them now dispossessed of the wealth they amassed in a collapsing Soviet Union, and all of whom have been run out of the country or imprisoned – have the most powerful of motives. They hate Putin and seek to bring him down. And Goldfarb and Litvinenko both enjoyed the patronage of the billionaire Berezovsky.

Surely, rogue or retired KGB agents, passed over by Putin and bitter at Litvinenko, would have a motive: to send a message, written in polonium-210, that this is what happens to those who betray us and Mother Russia.

Scotland Yard has yet to declare this a murder case and is looking into the possibility of a "martyrdom operation" – suicide dressed up like murder – in which Litvinenko may have colluded. The Putin-dominated Russian press is pushing this line, as well as the idea of an oligarchs' plot to discredit Putin and destroy Russia's relations with the West.

Yet Litvinenko was still in his early 40s, with a wife and two children. While his agonizing public death would make him a celebrity even more famous than Georgi Markov, the Bulgarian anti-communist murdered in London in 1979 with a poison-tipped umbrella, Litvinenko would not be around to enjoy his fame.

America has a vital interest in this Scotland Yard investigation. What it discovers may tell us more about the character of the man into whose eyes George Bush claimed to have stared, and seen his soul, or it may tell us who the real enemies of this country are, who are out to restart the Cold War, and perhaps another hot one.

[John Simkin]

It has been reported today that it has emerged that a number of British Airways aircraft that fly between Moscow and London have been contaminated with radioactive material. Alexander Litvinenko was not a passenger on these jets. One man who was is Andrei Lugovoi who met Litvinenko at the Millennium Hotel in London's West End on November 1, on the day he fell ill. Lugovoi is a former KGB bodyguard who now runs a security company in Moscow. He said that he flew in the day before with his family and friends to attend a Champions League football match between Arsenal and CSKA Moscow and for a series of business meetings.

[John Geraghty]

It has been reported today that it has emerged that a number of British Airways aircraft that fly between Moscow and London have been contaminated with radioactive material. Alexander Litvinenko was not a passenger on these jets. One man who was is Andrei Lugovoi who met Litvinenko at the Millennium Hotel in London's West End on November 1, on the day he fell ill. Lugovoi is a former KGB bodyguard who now runs a security company in Moscow. He said that he flew in the day before with his family and friends to attend a Champions League football match between Arsenal and CSKA Moscow and for a series of business meetings.

Very interesting indeed. Here is an interview with Lugovoi http://www.mosnews.com/interview/2006/11/24/lugovoi.shtml

And the gurdian article http://www.guardian.co.uk/russia/article/0,,1957466,00.html

Shockingly he hasn't come clean yet!

There is a possible connection between Litvikenko's death and the illness of a former Russian Prime minister, who was visiting Ireland recently. He was attedning a conference at the National University of Ireland, Maynooth (my University) after which he was taken ill. My head of department organised the conference as far as I can tell, I might send him an email asking if his thoughts on the matter.

Here is a link to the article, http://www.ireland.com/newspaper/world/200...4823695057.html

I doubt that Mr.Lugovoi made a pitstop in Ireland.

John

[John Geraghty]

Yegor Gaidar was brought to hospital in Dublin's James Connolly memorial hospital, which is 6 minutes walk from my house.

I will do the rounds and see if I can find anything out.

Here is the BBC article http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/europe/6159343.stm

John

Edited November 30, 2006 by John Geraghty

[John Geraghty]

It has been reported today that it has emerged that a number of British Airways aircraft that fly between Moscow and London have been contaminated with radioactive material. Alexander Litvinenko was not a passenger on these jets. One man who was is Andrei Lugovoi who met Litvinenko at the Millennium Hotel in London's West End on November 1, on the day he fell ill. Lugovoi is a former KGB bodyguard who now runs a security company in Moscow. He said that he flew in the day before with his family and friends to attend a Champions League football match between Arsenal and CSKA Moscow and for a series of business meetings.

Very interesting indeed. Here is an interview with Lugovoi http://www.mosnews.com/interview/2006/11/24/lugovoi.shtml

And the gurdian article http://www.guardian.co.uk/russia/article/0,,1957466,00.html

Shockingly he hasn't come clean yet!

There is a possible connection between Litvikenko's death and the illness of a former Russian Prime minister, who was visiting Ireland recently. He was attedning a conference at the National University of Ireland, Maynooth (my University) after which he was taken ill. My head of department organised the conference as far as I can tell, I might send him an email asking if his thoughts on the matter.

Here is a link to the article, http://www.ireland.com/newspaper/world/200...4823695057.html

I doubt that Mr.Lugovoi made a pitstop in Ireland.

John

Well it seems that Mr.Lugovoi didn't make a stop in Ireland, however Mr.Gaidar made a stop in London.

Take a wild guess at who Gaidar's (former Prime Minister unde Yeltsin) former bodyguard was? Thats right Mr.Lugovoi!

John

[John Simkin]

Report in today's Guardian:

British intelligence sources increasingly suspect that Alexander Litvinenko, the former spy killed with a radioactive poison, was the victim of a plot involving "rogue elements" within the Russian state, the Guardian has learned.

While ruling out any official involvement by Vladimir Putin's government, investigators believe that only those with access to state nuclear laboratories could have mounted such a sophisticated plot.

Police were last night closing in on a group of men who entered the UK among a large crowd of Muscovite football fans. The group of five or more arrived shortly before Mr Litvinenko fell ill and attended the CSKA Moscow match against Arsenal at the Emirates stadium on November 1. They flew back shortly afterwards. While describing them only as witnesses, police believe their presence could hold the key to the former spy's death.

As with the JFK assassination, "rogue elements" within the intelligence community is being blamed for the death. This raises two questions:

1. What motives would "rogue elements" have for killing Alexander Litvinenko?

2. How did they get hold of polonium 210. John Large, an independent nuclear consultant, has claimed: "No individual could do this. What you are talking about is the creation of a very clever little device, a designer poison pill, possibly created by nanotechnology. Without nanotechnology you would be talking about a fairly big pill, a pea-sized pill. Either way you are looking at intricate technology which is beyond the means and designs of a hired assassin without a state sponsor."

[Peter McKenna]

The plot thickens....Italian academic Mario Scaramella, a friend of Alexander Litvinenko, tested positive for polonium-210 and has been hospitalized. He had a 30-45 min meeting with Litvinenko at a sushi-bar just before Litvinenko took ill. He claims he ate nothing there and only drank water. Both were on a list of persons to be hurt by the Russian security service [according to Scaramella].

This is the British equivalent to the American anthrax episode, it seems.....one thing is for sure, someone had the ability to get one hell of a lot of rare Po-210! Another Italian parlimentarian is also afraid he might be next.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/6199464.stm

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/6163502.stm

Please note: there may well be a 9-11 connection also: Litvinenko alleged that al-Qaeda number two Ayman al-Zawahiri was trained by the FSB in Dagestan before the 9/11 attacks!

I would comment on the editorial statement made that a “special designer pill” could have been manufactured for the poisoning of Mr. Litvinenko, that this is probably far fetched. This material would best be handled by being placed in a solution of water or other liquid, as this would make it much easier to control, and probably delivered via syringe or similar delivery method. You have to ask yourself, “How would I do it?”

I read many years ago, that it was standard KGB tradecraft to have a syringe loaded with the weapon (a poison of some kind) under a coat or newspaper, and then to deliver it in a crowd, typically at a crowded airport, restaurant, etc. This technique was repeated through many works, Suverov, maybe Grushenko, being quoted by Angleton, or some such (I can't remember, it has been many years). I do remember reading this bit of tradecraft in an old compendium of Intel tradecraft ‘dirty tricks’. The mark wouldn’t suspect anything other than what would probably feel like a pinch or scratch, when delivered by expert hands.

And yes, polonium 210 in solution, in a syringe, would be undetectable as it is a major alpha emitter only.

Polonium 210 is a fairly easily obtained radionuclide used in the manufacture of static eliminators (like in removing static charge from fabric in manufacture). The polonium is atomized and cast into ceramic nodules, such that it is rendered harmless.

Typically a license for use of an isotope must be granted (in the US this wold be the USNRC) to utilize a radionuclide such as polonium 210, however in Russia, or other country with lesser control of such materials (I read where Russia exports about one thousand grams of Polonium 210 per year), obtaining the isotope would probably be fairly easy for anyone in the manufacturing infrastructure.

The delivery mechanism of such a weapon is much more instructional or informational than the weapon itself. The handling, by an expert, would imply a certain regard for "Clean" treatment, i.e., to deliver without spreading about.

The traces should be nothing other than the excretion of Litvinenko's body burden, the traces shouldn't indicate anything of the weapon deliverer, unless handled by a moron, which apparently was the case, or someone attempting to appear amateurish, based upon the current litter of polonium spread about London.

Polonium 210 has a 138 day half life, so the forensics are very important and should tell whether the traces are from the same source as had come from Litvinenko or some other, different, source.

These pieces seem to indicate that this is a conspiracy to place the blame on the FSB or Putin. If the FSB had executed Litvinenko, it should have been handled with a little more finesse. The use of Polonium as a weapon could only be a means of identifying the source as being of a very select few, which would seem to be a set-up. The fact that the polonium was spread about seems to indicate amateur theatrics.

[Jack White]

The plot thickens....Italian academic Mario Scaramella, a friend of Alexander Litvinenko, tested positive for polonium-210 and has been hospitalized. He had a 30-45 min meeting with Litvinenko at a sushi-bar just before Litvinenko took ill. He claims he ate nothing there and only drank water. Both were on a list of persons to be hurt by the Russian security service [according to Scaramella].

This is the British equivalent to the American anthrax episode, it seems.....one thing is for sure, someone had the ability to get one hell of a lot of rare Po-210! Another Italian parlimentarian is also afraid he might be next.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/6199464.stm

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/6163502.stm

Please note: there may well be a 9-11 connection also: Litvinenko alleged that al-Qaeda number two Ayman al-Zawahiri was trained by the FSB in Dagestan before the 9/11 attacks!

I would comment on the editorial statement made that a “special designer pill” could have been manufactured for the poisoning of Mr. Litvinenko, that this is probably far fetched. This material would best be handled by being placed in a solution of water or other liquid, as this would make it much easier to control, and probably delivered via syringe or similar delivery method. You have to ask yourself, “How would I do it?”

I read many years ago, that it was standard KGB tradecraft to have a syringe loaded with the weapon (a poison of some kind) under a coat or newspaper, and then to deliver it in a crowd, typically at a crowded airport, restaurant, etc. This technique was repeated through many works, Suverov, maybe Grushenko, being quoted by Angleton, or some such (I can't remember, it has been many years). I do remember reading this bit of tradecraft in an old compendium of Intel tradecraft ‘dirty tricks’. The mark wouldn’t suspect anything other than what would probably feel like a pinch or scratch, when delivered by expert hands.

And yes, polonium 210 in solution, in a syringe, would be undetectable as it is a major alpha emitter only.

Polonium 210 is a fairly easily obtained radionuclide used in the manufacture of static eliminators (like in removing static charge from fabric in manufacture). The polonium is atomized and cast into ceramic nodules, such that it is rendered harmless.

Typically a license for use of an isotope must be granted (in the US this wold be the USNRC) to utilize a radionuclide such as polonium 210, however in Russia, or other country with lesser control of such materials (I read where Russia exports about one thousand grams of Polonium 210 per year), obtaining the isotope would probably be fairly easy for anyone in the manufacturing infrastructure.

The delivery mechanism of such a weapon is much more instructional or informational than the weapon itself. The handling, by an expert, would imply a certain regard for "Clean" treatment, i.e., to deliver without spreading about.

The traces should be nothing other than the excretion of Litvinenko's body burden, the traces shouldn't indicate anything of the weapon deliverer, unless handled by a moron, which apparently was the case, or someone attempting to appear amateurish, based upon the current litter of polonium spread about London.

Polonium 210 has a 138 day half life, so the forensics are very important and should tell whether the traces are from the same source as had come from Litvinenko or some other, different, source.

These pieces seem to indicate that this is a conspiracy to place the blame on the FSB or Putin. If the FSB had executed Litvinenko, it should have been handled with a little more finesse. The use of Polonium as a weapon could only be a means of identifying the source as being of a very select few, which would seem to be a set-up. The fact that the polonium was spread about seems to indicate amateur theatrics.

Are you the same Peter McKenna who (with wife) helped me take photos

in Dealey Plaza a number of years ago?

Jack

[Peter McKenna]

The plot thickens....Italian academic Mario Scaramella, a friend of Alexander Litvinenko, tested positive for polonium-210 and has been hospitalized. He had a 30-45 min meeting with Litvinenko at a sushi-bar just before Litvinenko took ill. He claims he ate nothing there and only drank water. Both were on a list of persons to be hurt by the Russian security service [according to Scaramella].

This is the British equivalent to the American anthrax episode, it seems.....one thing is for sure, someone had the ability to get one hell of a lot of rare Po-210! Another Italian parlimentarian is also afraid he might be next.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/6199464.stm

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/6163502.stm

Please note: there may well be a 9-11 connection also: Litvinenko alleged that al-Qaeda number two Ayman al-Zawahiri was trained by the FSB in Dagestan before the 9/11 attacks!

I would comment on the editorial statement made that a “special designer pill” could have been manufactured for the poisoning of Mr. Litvinenko, that this is probably far fetched. This material would best be handled by being placed in a solution of water or other liquid, as this would make it much easier to control, and probably delivered via syringe or similar delivery method. You have to ask yourself, “How would I do it?”

I read many years ago, that it was standard KGB tradecraft to have a syringe loaded with the weapon (a poison of some kind) under a coat or newspaper, and then to deliver it in a crowd, typically at a crowded airport, restaurant, etc. This technique was repeated through many works, Suverov, maybe Grushenko, being quoted by Angleton, or some such (I can't remember, it has been many years). I do remember reading this bit of tradecraft in an old compendium of Intel tradecraft ‘dirty tricks’. The mark wouldn’t suspect anything other than what would probably feel like a pinch or scratch, when delivered by expert hands.

And yes, polonium 210 in solution, in a syringe, would be undetectable as it is a major alpha emitter only.

Polonium 210 is a fairly easily obtained radionuclide used in the manufacture of static eliminators (like in removing static charge from fabric in manufacture). The polonium is atomized and cast into ceramic nodules, such that it is rendered harmless.

Typically a license for use of an isotope must be granted (in the US this wold be the USNRC) to utilize a radionuclide such as polonium 210, however in Russia, or other country with lesser control of such materials (I read where Russia exports about one thousand grams of Polonium 210 per year), obtaining the isotope would probably be fairly easy for anyone in the manufacturing infrastructure.

The delivery mechanism of such a weapon is much more instructional or informational than the weapon itself. The handling, by an expert, would imply a certain regard for "Clean" treatment, i.e., to deliver without spreading about.

The traces should be nothing other than the excretion of Litvinenko's body burden, the traces shouldn't indicate anything of the weapon deliverer, unless handled by a moron, which apparently was the case, or someone attempting to appear amateurish, based upon the current litter of polonium spread about London.

Polonium 210 has a 138 day half life, so the forensics are very important and should tell whether the traces are from the same source as had come from Litvinenko or some other, different, source.

These pieces seem to indicate that this is a conspiracy to place the blame on the FSB or Putin. If the FSB had executed Litvinenko, it should have been handled with a little more finesse. The use of Polonium as a weapon could only be a means of identifying the source as being of a very select few, which would seem to be a set-up. The fact that the polonium was spread about seems to indicate amateur theatrics.

Are you the same Peter McKenna who (with wife) helped me take photos

in Dealey Plaza a number of years ago?

Jack

[Are you the same Peter McKenna who (with wife) helped me take photos

in Dealey Plaza a number of years ago?

Jack

I lived in the Dallas area (Granbury, Texas) from 1988 through 1992. I don't remember taking pictures in Dealey Plaza, but could have. I didn't spend very m uch time in Dallas.

Peter McKenna

[Jack White]

The plot thickens....Italian academic Mario Scaramella, a friend of Alexander Litvinenko, tested positive for polonium-210 and has been hospitalized. He had a 30-45 min meeting with Litvinenko at a sushi-bar just before Litvinenko took ill. He claims he ate nothing there and only drank water. Both were on a list of persons to be hurt by the Russian security service [according to Scaramella].

This is the British equivalent to the American anthrax episode, it seems.....one thing is for sure, someone had the ability to get one hell of a lot of rare Po-210! Another Italian parlimentarian is also afraid he might be next.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/6199464.stm

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/6163502.stm

Please note: there may well be a 9-11 connection also: Litvinenko alleged that al-Qaeda number two Ayman al-Zawahiri was trained by the FSB in Dagestan before the 9/11 attacks!

I would comment on the editorial statement made that a “special designer pill” could have been manufactured for the poisoning of Mr. Litvinenko, that this is probably far fetched. This material would best be handled by being placed in a solution of water or other liquid, as this would make it much easier to control, and probably delivered via syringe or similar delivery method. You have to ask yourself, “How would I do it?”

I read many years ago, that it was standard KGB tradecraft to have a syringe loaded with the weapon (a poison of some kind) under a coat or newspaper, and then to deliver it in a crowd, typically at a crowded airport, restaurant, etc. This technique was repeated through many works, Suverov, maybe Grushenko, being quoted by Angleton, or some such (I can't remember, it has been many years). I do remember reading this bit of tradecraft in an old compendium of Intel tradecraft ‘dirty tricks’. The mark wouldn’t suspect anything other than what would probably feel like a pinch or scratch, when delivered by expert hands.

And yes, polonium 210 in solution, in a syringe, would be undetectable as it is a major alpha emitter only.

Polonium 210 is a fairly easily obtained radionuclide used in the manufacture of static eliminators (like in removing static charge from fabric in manufacture). The polonium is atomized and cast into ceramic nodules, such that it is rendered harmless.

Typically a license for use of an isotope must be granted (in the US this wold be the USNRC) to utilize a radionuclide such as polonium 210, however in Russia, or other country with lesser control of such materials (I read where Russia exports about one thousand grams of Polonium 210 per year), obtaining the isotope would probably be fairly easy for anyone in the manufacturing infrastructure.

The delivery mechanism of such a weapon is much more instructional or informational than the weapon itself. The handling, by an expert, would imply a certain regard for "Clean" treatment, i.e., to deliver without spreading about.

The traces should be nothing other than the excretion of Litvinenko's body burden, the traces shouldn't indicate anything of the weapon deliverer, unless handled by a moron, which apparently was the case, or someone attempting to appear amateurish, based upon the current litter of polonium spread about London.

Polonium 210 has a 138 day half life, so the forensics are very important and should tell whether the traces are from the same source as had come from Litvinenko or some other, different, source.

These pieces seem to indicate that this is a conspiracy to place the blame on the FSB or Putin. If the FSB had executed Litvinenko, it should have been handled with a little more finesse. The use of Polonium as a weapon could only be a means of identifying the source as being of a very select few, which would seem to be a set-up. The fact that the polonium was spread about seems to indicate amateur theatrics.

Are you the same Peter McKenna who (with wife) helped me take photos

in Dealey Plaza a number of years ago?

Jack

[Are you the same Peter McKenna who (with wife) helped me take photos

in Dealey Plaza a number of years ago?

Jack

I lived in the Dallas area (Granbury, Texas) from 1988 through 1992. I don't remember taking pictures in Dealey Plaza, but could have. I didn't spend very m uch time in Dallas.

Peter McKenna

Thanks, Peter. No, the person with the same name as yours

was a researcher from New York. His wife's name was Perrin.

Jack

[John Simkin]

Russia's prosecutor general will not extradite suspects in the poisoning of ex-spy Alexander Litvinenko to Britain. Yuri Chaika said any trial of a Russian citizen must take place in Russia. The Russian government is determined that none of its secrets are given away in court.

[Peter McKenna]

"........ Alexander Rahr, a leading Russia expert at the German Council on Foreign Relations, a Berlin-based think tank, Tuesday told United Press International via telephone from New York.

He added that there were three main theories of who was responsible for Litvinenko's death, the first being that Putin wanted to silence one of his most outspoken critics; the second that conservative forces in Russia wanted to hurt Russia's relations with the West so that Putin would be forced to call back elections and establish a dictatorial regime; the third being that Russian exile oligarchs wanted to destabilize the Kremlin in a way that would allow them to return back home and reclaim their lost wealth. That third theory would include in the range of suspects Boris Berezovsky, the exiled oligarch, in whose house police found traces of the radioactive isotope.

Rahr said all three theories had to be pursued, but called the first one "unrealistic."

"Putin has come out as the big loser of these murders," Rahr told UPI. "If it was indeed the Russian FSB, why would they transport the polonium in a passenger plane and not in a diplomat's suitcase on board of a Russian Aeroflot cargo plane? Why would they leave so many trails?"

While it could be that Putin didn't have control over the entire FSB, Rahr said one of the other two theories appeared more likely to him.

"The killings are like terrorist attacks aimed at destabilizing the power structure in Russia," he said."

The above is from Alexander Rahr, a leading Russia expert at the German Council on Foreign Relations, a German think tank. I think he makes alot of sense.

This may be a precursor to a new Cold War. There were always alot of nationalistic Russians who have wanted to return to the "old ways" of the totalitarian government.

I heard Alexander Haig speak at Texas Christian University (I believe it was 1988 or 1989), and he predicted then, that "they (the hard liners) would be back someday".

"........ Alexander Rahr, a leading Russia expert at the German Council on Foreign Relations, a Berlin-based think tank, Tuesday told United Press International via telephone from New York.

He added that there were three main theories of who was responsible for Litvinenko's death, the first being that Putin wanted to silence one of his most outspoken critics; the second that conservative forces in Russia wanted to hurt Russia's relations with the West so that Putin would be forced to call back elections and establish a dictatorial regime; the third being that Russian exile oligarchs wanted to destabilize the Kremlin in a way that would allow them to return back home and reclaim their lost wealth. That third theory would include in the range of suspects Boris Berezovsky, the exiled oligarch, in whose house police found traces of the radioactive isotope.

Rahr said all three theories had to be pursued, but called the first one "unrealistic."

"Putin has come out as the big loser of these murders," Rahr told UPI. "If it was indeed the Russian FSB, why would they transport the polonium in a passenger plane and not in a diplomat's suitcase on board of a Russian Aeroflot cargo plane? Why would they leave so many trails?"

While it could be that Putin didn't have control over the entire FSB, Rahr said one of the other two theories appeared more likely to him.

"The killings are like terrorist attacks aimed at destabilizing the power structure in Russia," he said."

The above is from Alexander Rahr, a leading Russia expert at the German Council on Foreign Relations, a German think tank. I think he makes alot of sense.

This may be a precursor to a new Cold War. There were always alot of nationalistic Russians who have wanted to return to the "old ways" of the totalitarian government.

I heard Alexander Haig speak at Texas Christian University (I believe it was 1988 or 1989), and he predicted then, that "they (the hard liners) would be back someday".

Sorry, I forgot to give the origin of the quote:

It's from UPI, BERLIN, Dec. 5 (UPI)

Peter McKenna

The following from the Hindu Times on availability of Polonium 210,

Very informative:

"Radioactive Polonium 210 widely available: report

New York, Dec. 4 (PTI): Radioactive Polonium 210 used to poison former Russian spy Alexander V Litvinenko may not be as rare as reported after his death.

The deadly substance, once touted to be available only with specialised laboratories, is now available "all over the place" and by estimates, the lethal doze might cost less than 23 dollars, a media report has said.

Experts initially called it quite rare, with some claiming that only the Kremlin had the wherewithal to administer a lethal dose. But public and private inquiries have shown that it proliferated quite widely during the nuclear era and of late as an industrial commodity.

"You can get it all over the place," William Happer, a physicist at Princeton who has advised the United States government on nuclear forensics, said.

Today polonium 210 can show up in everything from atom bombs, to antistatic brushes to cigarette smoke, though in the last case only minute quantities are involved.

Iran, it says, made relatively large amounts of polonium 210 in what some experts call a secret effort to develop nuclear arms, and North Korea probably used it to trigger its recent nuclear blast.

Commercially, Web sites and companies sell many products based on polonium 210, with labels warning of health dangers.

"Radiation from polonium is dangerous if the solid material is ingested or inhaled," warns the label of an antistatic brush.

Peter D Zimmerman, a professor in the war studies department of King's College, London, told the Times that the many industrial uses of polonium 210 threatened to complicate efforts at solving the Litvinenko case.

The debut of nuclear reactors, experts say, let scientists make polonium 210 by the pound. The substance emits swarms of subatomic rays, and the report said that Manhattan Project in 1945 used them to trigger the world's first atom bombs.

President Eisenhower, eager to promote "atoms for peace," had the high heats of polonium 210 turned into electricity for satellites. But the batteries lost power relatively fast because of the material's short half-life, just 138 days.

By the 1960s, researchers worried increasingly about polonium 210's deadly health effects. Harvard researchers found it in cigarette smoke and argued that its concentrations were high enough to make its radioactivity a contributing fact or in lung cancer.

Vilma R Hunt, who helped lead the studies, called polonium 210 a nightmare for health workers, and perhaps sleuths, because it tended to move about in unexpected ways."It crawls the walls," she told the paper in an interview. "It can be lost for a while and then come back." Though dangerous when breathed, injected or ingested, the material is harmless outside the human body.

Industrial companies found polonium 210 to be ideal for making static eliminators that remove dust from film, lenses and laboratory balances, as well as paper and textile plants.

Its rays, the report says, produce an electric charge on nearby air. Bits of dust with static attract the charged air, which neutralizes them. Once free of static, the dust is easy to blow or brush away."

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

[John Simkin]

http://www.guardian.co.uk/uk_news/story/0,,1968117,00.html

Ian Cobain, Jeevan Vasagar, Tom Parfitt in Moscow

Saturday December 9, 2006

The Guardian

The assassins who poisoned Alexander Litvinenko in a London hotel bar may have exposed themselves to a potentially fatal dose of radioactivity, according to an FBI assessment of the killing.

Tests which have revealed a trail of polonium-210 across more than a dozen locations around the capital suggest the killers could have ingested substantial amounts of the isotope.

Seven staff at the Pine Bar of the Millennium Hotel on Grosvenor Square have been poisoned with small amounts of polonium-210, along with at least two business associates of the Russian ex-spy, possibly after it had been dissolved in a solution which would have evaporated during the poisoning.

Yesterday the Pine Bar was sealed off, with uniformed police officers guarding the entrance. Two third-floor rooms were also sealed off.

At least one of the seven contaminated hotel staff is said to be on holiday, while others were still working. "They're just not allowed to serve food at the moment," said a colleague. The hotel worker, who is close to one of the seven staff contaminated with polonium-210, said: "No one's batted an eyelid. There's nothing you can do about it - so why worry? It's a 5% increased chance of cancer in your lifetime, when you've got a 30% chance of cancer anyway. Hopefully it will all blow over. It's just the media and the police keep kicking it off."

Officials from the FBI, which has been asked to offer technical assistance to the British investigation, have concluded that the killers were not professionally trained to handle the substance. This suggests the use of radioactive material made the killing "as much a message as a murder", according to FBI sources.

The FBI has been helping British investigators trying to pinpoint the source of the polonium-210. So far it has been able to establish only that it was brought to London from Moscow.

Associates of the dead former spy have always insisted he was murdered on the orders of the Kremlin in a manner intended to terrify other emigres, an accusation which Russian president Vladimir Putin has personally denied.

Yesterday Vladimir Bukovsky, a dissident who fled the Soviet Union for Britain 30 years ago, said: "Terrorist acts are always calculated to affect others. In this case I wouldn't say it's especially addressed to the refugee community. It's addressed to all Russians inside the country and outside, to say: 'We have very long hands.' They are afraid of a revolution, which is rubbish, it's not going to happen, but some individuals believe it may."

Russia's prosecutor-general says he too is investigating the death of Mr Litvinenko and may ask permission for a team of Russian detectives to fly to London.

A spokesman for the prosecutor-general's office said investigators could request a meeting in London with Boris Berezovsky, the London-based Russian multimillionaire, and with Akhmed Zakayev, the Chechen rebel envoy, both close associates of Mr Litvinenko. Russian politicians have consistently suggested that Mr Berezovsky, who fled to London in 2000 after falling out with President Putin, has used the death of Mr Litvinenko as a "provocation" to discredit the Kremlin, an allegation the businessman denies.

Mr Berezovsky said he would cooperate with the British and Russian police. "I absolutely trust the British police and absolutely don't trust the Russian," he said. "But even in a very bad organisation there are some real people who really care to know the truth, and maybe there is at least one in the Russian police."

Two of Mr Litvinenko's business associates who stayed at the hotel between October 31 and November 3 were undergoing tests at an unnamed Moscow hospital yesterday. One, Dmitri Kovtun, was said by Russian authorities to have suffered radioactive poisoning, although there were conflicting reports about whether he is seriously ill.

Mr Kovtun and another associate, Andrei Lugovoi, have both denied any involvement in the incident and pledged to cooperate fully with the British inquiry. Mr Kovtun was interviewed in the presence of British police on Thursday, but Scotland Yard would not say whether Mr Lugovoi had also been questioned.

Yesterday it also emerged that initial tests which suggested that Mario Scaramella, an Italian associate of Mr Litvinenko, had ingested large amounts of polonium-210 were either incorrect or misread.

He is understood to have been poisoned with relatively small amounts of the substance, is not thought to be in immediate danger, and has been discharged from hospital.

[John Simkin]

Luke Harding in Berlin, Jeevan Vasagar and Tom Parfitt in Moscow

Monday December 11, 2006

The Guardian

http://www.guardian.co.uk/germany/article/0,,1969256,00.html

One of the key witnesses to the murder of Alexander Litvinenko was contaminated with polonium-210 at least four days before he met the former Russian spy in a London hotel bar, German police revealed yesterday. Dmitry Kovtun, who met Mr Litvinenko on November 1, the day he was poisoned, had already been in contact with the radioactive substance, German investigators said.

The German inquiry focuses on whether he was in illegal contact with radioactive materials rather than the murder of Mr Litvinenko itself. At a press conference, a senior prosecutor said that one possible explanation was that while "packaging or transporting" the polonium before the meeting, Mr Kovtun had been "sloppy" and accidentally touched it.

However, the German authorities said the evidence did not necessarily mean that Mr Kovtun had carried a polonium source with him from Moscow to London via Hamburg in order to poison Mr Litvinenko. He may simply have been contaminated by the material and carried traces with him.

Mr Kovtun, a Russian businessman, met Mr Litvinenko together with another business associate, Andrei Lugovoi, at London's Millennium hotel shortly before the KGB defector fell fatally ill.

Mr Lugovoi has suggested that he and Mr Kovtun were contaminated with radiation when they met Mr Litvinenko on an earlier trip to London in October.

Both men are being tested for radiation poisoning at a Moscow clinic. They have denied any involvement in the murder, and offered to cooperate fully with Scotland Yard's inquiry.

Over the weekend detectives discovered traces of polonium they believe were left by Mr Kovtun across northern Germany. According to German officials, the trail includes a flat in Hamburg belonging to his ex-wife and an apartment where he stayed with his former mother-in-law. They also found radioactive traces in a car used to collect him from Hamburg airport on October 28 and on a document he touched.

The latest twist came as Mr Litvinenko's widow, Marina, broke her silence to accuse the Russian state of complicity in the murder. She told a Sunday newspaper:" Obviously it was not Putin himself, of course not. But what Putin does around him in Russia makes it possible to kill a British person on British soil. I believe that it could have been the Russian authorities."

German state prosecutor Martin Köhnke said an investigation had been launched on the suspicion that Mr Kovtun had been in "illegal contact with radioactive substances". But it was unclear whether he had swallowed the polonium or merely touched it.

"One possibility is that he came into contact with polonium while transporting or packaging it in Moscow. But we can't say at this point whether he is a victim or a suspect." German police are now liaising directly with Scotland Yard, and a British officer is expected to meet German counterparts today.

Mr Kovtun first met Mr Litvinenko in London on October 16. They were introduced by Mr Lugovoi to discuss joint projects, probably security and risk analysis for British companies investing in Russia.

When he was contacted by the Guardian shortly after it was revealed that Mr Litvinenko was killed by the radioactive isotope polonium-210, Mr Kovtun said: "I have no idea what that substance is. I should probably go and get myself checked out."

Speaking of himself and Mr Lugovoi, he added: "It's completely possible that we were contaminated when we met him [Litvinenko] - which is bad, especially for Andrei because he introduced his son and his wife to him."

In a further development, Scotland Yard confirmed that two British police officers involved in the Litvinenko investigation had tested positive for "relatively small traces" of polonium-210.