Radiation Poisoning Killed Ex-Russian Spy

Radiation Poisoning Killed Ex-Russian Spy — The British authorities said today that Alexander V. Litvinenko, a former Russian K.G.B. officer and foe of the Kremlin, died of radiation poisoning here in what a senior official called “an unprecedented event.”

Police said radioactive traces were found at three London locations, underscoring the highly unusual nature of the whole episode, which began when Mr. Litvinenko first complained of feeling unwell three weeks ago.

Alexander V. Litvinenko in his hospital bed in London on Nov. 20

In a day of fast-paced developments that resembled a dark political thriller, Mr. Litvinenko’s family issued what they said was his deathbed statement accusing President Vladimir V. Putin of “barbaric and ruthless” murder, a charge promptly rejected by the Russian leader.

Mr. Litvinenko’s father, Walter, also accused Russian authorities of responsibility and said his son was “killed by a little, tiny nuclear bomb.”

Photographs of the dying former agent had showed him hairless and gaunt in a hospital bed, and friends who visited him said he looked ghostly. Developments in the case over the past week have tantalized Britons, confronting them with the notion that their land might be used as a theater for sinister machinations more familiar in a James Bond movie.

Word of a possible radiation attack, using what officials identified as a rare and highly radioactive isotope known as Polonium 210, sounded alarms across London, although many Londoners seemed to take word of the alert with a degree of stoicism, or even indifference, on a damp Friday evening.

“Spy Radiation: Major Alert,” said a banner headline in The Evening Standard.

Police said they had found radioactive traces at several locations which Mr. Litvinenko had visited in early November — the Itsu sushi bar on Piccadilly, his home in north London and the Mayfair Millennium Hotel near the American Embassy in Grosvenor Square — and were continuing to search them for evidence. The authorities also said they were trying to find nurses and other medical staff who had treated Mr. Litvinenko since he began to complain of an unspecified illness on Nov. 1.

Roger Cox, the director of the Health Protection Agency’s center for radiation, chemicals and environmental hazards, said a large quantity of alpha radiation had been found in Mr. Litvinenko’s urine. “If that enters the body by ingestion, then it will rapidly track through the body and go to most major organs,” he said.

Mr. Cox said that a computer model was being used to try to work backwards from the alpha radiation levels found today to estimate the magnitude of the initial exposure.

At a news conference, Dr Pat Troop, the agency’s chief executive, described Mr. Litvinenko’s death as “an unprecedented event in the U.K.” and said he had “apparently been poisoned by a type of radiation.”

Polonium 210 is found naturally in low amounts in the human body and in the natural environment. It is available on the Internet and has industrial uses, “but the only time it becomes dangerous is if you ingest it or breathe it in,” said Dave Butler, a British radiation expert.

A British counterterrorism official, who spoke in return for anonymity because of the sensitivity of the case, said polonium was a byproduct of the nuclear industry and used in industry in the production of anti-static materials.

But the form believed to have been used in the suspected poisoning would have required high grade technical skills and a sophisticated scientific process to produce. The official declined to comment on what security measures were being taken to locate possible sources for the substance.

Mr. Litvinenko, 43, was a former operative in the K.G.B. who became a colonel in its successor organization, known by its Russian initials as the F.S.B. In the late 1990s, Mr. Litvinenko said publicly that he had been ordered by assassinate Boris Berezovsky, an exiled Russian tycoon, but had refused to do so. He fled to Britain and secured British citizenship earlier this year. In 2003 he authored a book accusing the Russian Secret Service of orchestrating apartment house bombings in Russia in 1999 that led to the second Chechen war.

Since his illness became known last week, his friends have depicted his poisoning as an officially-sanctioned reprisal for his criticism of the Kremlin and his efforts to investigate the fatal shooting in Moscow last month of Anna Politkovskaya, an investigative journalist.

Before news broke of the discovery of evidence of radiation poisoning, Alex Goldfarb, a friend of Mr. Litvinenko, read out to reporters what was described as his deathbed statement, addressed largely to President Putin.

“You may succeed in silencing me but that silence comes at a price,” the statement read. “You have shown yourself to be as barbaric and ruthless as your most hostile critics have claimed.”

“You have shown yourself to have no respect for life, liberty or any civilized value,” the statement said. “May God forgive you for what you have done, not only to me but to beloved Russia and its people.”

Mr. Litvinenko’s death, announced late Thursday, threatened to build diplomatic strains between Britain and Russia, but Britain sought to avoid a major crisis. A Foreign Office official, who spoke in return for customary anonymity, said the Russian ambassador here, Yury V. Fedotov, was called to the Foreign Office today and told that “police were pursuing their investigations and the situation was now more serious.”

British officials wanted Russia to help the inquiry with any information they might have about the case, the official said.

Mr. Putin found himself on the defensive when he appeared in Helsinki following a meeting with leaders of the European Union, as he had been when he traveled to Europe following the death of Ms. Politkovskaya.

He called Mr. Litvinenko’s death a tragedy, but suggested that there was “no indication that it was a violent death,” citing what he said was a British medical report. He called for an investigation and pledged the assistance of Russian authorities.

“I hope that the British authorities will not contribute to the fanning up of political scandals having no real grounds,” he said in remarks that were televised in Russia and given unusual prominence in state newscasts, given the gravity of the accusations being directed at Mr. Putin’s Kremlin.

Mr. Putin also brushed aside the significance of Mr. Litvinenko’s statement, suggesting his death was being used for political purposes.

“Those who did it are not the Lord and Mr. Litvinenko is not Lazarus,” he went on. “It is regretful that even such tragic events as a death of a human being is being used for political provocations.” ( nytimes.com )