LONDON // The most sensational spy tale since the Cold War lands in a London court on Tuesday as an inquiry into the radiation poisoning death of Alexander Litvinenko begins.
The former agent with Russia’s FSB security service, who was doing work for Britain’s MI6, was killed with Polonium-210 in 2010, in a case referred to at the time as the world’s first act of nuclear terrorism.
British investigators believe that the hard-to-detect radioactive isotope was stirred into Litvinenko’s tea by two acquaintances who were visiting him from Moscow, Andrei Lugovoi and Dmitri Kovtun, at London’s Mayfair hotel.
The rebel spy died three weeks later and a statement read out in his name accused President Vladimir Putin of direct involvement, saying that “the howl of protest from around the world will reverberate, Mr Putin, in your ears for the rest of your life”.
The hearings will be held behind closed doors because members of the secret services may have to testify and the remit for chairman Robert Owen includes examining intelligence documents.
Britain's Daily Telegraph newspaper reported ahead of the hearings that communications between London and Moscow intercepted by the US National Security Agency pointed to Russian state involvement.
Mr Owen, who was the coroner in a previous judicial inquest into Litvinenko’s killing, has said he believes there is evidence of “a prima facie case as to the culpability of the Russian state”.
The theory that Russia was behind the killing is not the only one, given Litvinenko’s investigative work in other European countries including Italy and Spain and his specialisation in researching organised crime.
During the inquest, it also emerged that Litvinenko was working as a consultant for the MI6 foreign intelligence service.
Britain announced the inquiry in July 2014, days after the downing of a Malaysian passenger jet over eastern Ukraine – a tragedy blamed on Russia’s involvement in the conflict in the region – in what was seen as a way of imposing sanctions on Russia.
His widow Marina Litvinenko said, “My struggle has been for the facts to be made public. This is the last thing I can do for him, defend his name.”
* Agence France-Presse
