Russian UK Citizen Poisoned by Putin?

The Times On Line has the sad final struggle of a former KGB/FSB agent who wrote a book against Putin and accused Putin of sending him to the UK, where he defected, to kill prominent Russian billionaire Berezovsky.

Although Mr Nekrasov had seen Mr o sometimes more than once a day, Tuesday was the last occasion on which his friend could communicate properly. Yet in his final remarks, the former spy remained defiant in his battle against President Putin and the Russian security services.

He also managed a joke at his own expense, suggesting that his poisoning was proof that his campaign against the Kremlin had targeted the right people. "This is what it takes to prove one has been telling the truth," he said.

He was referring to allegations he made in a book, The FSB Blows up Russia, which accuses the Russian security services of causing a series of apartment block explosions in Moscow in 1999 that helped to propel Mr Putin into the presidency.

Last night in Moscow, Andrei Lugovoi, the former Kremlin bodyguard who has been accused of carrying out the poisoning, told The Times that he was not involved and that he was prepared to travel to London to prove his innocence.

The Russian KGB labs dedicated to new poisons have been so effective in their work that CSI London has been unable to identify the agent that killed the unfortunate Litvinenko.

Doctors remained baffled about what Mr Litvinenko ingested on November 1, at one of two meetings with Russian contacts. Geoff Bellingan, director of critical care at University College Hospital, said that doctors were now convinced that the cause was not a heavy metal such as thallium, as originally suspected. Nor had he swallowed any mystery objects. “Radiation poisoning is also unlikely,” he said.

Andrea Sella, a chemistry expert at University College, said that it had become increasingly difficult to identify the poison. "They have to find some unspecified poison. They don’t know whether it is a single substance or a mixture."

Meanwhile his colleagues are sad and baffled:

Mr Nekrasov revealed that Mr Litvinenko’s British citizenship had come through on the day of a service at Westminster Abbey for Anna Politkovskaya, a friend and critic of the Kremlin murdered in Moscow.

"We discussed the likelihood of another killing. Sasha warned me not to go back to Russia because it was too dangerous," Mr Nekrasov said. "Very sadly he turned out to be the next victim, attacked in the perceived safety of Central London."

Last night, Oleg Gordievsky, a KGB agent who defected to Britain, told Sky News: "It’s very sad news because he was a hero to Russia and a hero to Great Britain. He loved Britain as much as he loved Russia."

As Britain lurches into Euroweenie mode with the prospect of Gordon Browne's accession to power, predictably this will all be airbrushed away in the relations between Britain and Russia. The current EU president from Finland will certainly say that there is no cause for alarm, and that the EU must continue to dialogue with Russia as its czarevitch poisons his way, like a Medici prince, up the geopolitical ladder. The Ukrainian President certainly has more cause to worry, now that better poisons are out there than the dioxin that almost carried him away after dinner with friends of Putin.

An aide to Mr Putin said: "Of course it’s a human tragedy. A person was poisoned. But the accusations against the Kremiln are so incredible, so silly, that the President cannot comment."

Of course the Putinistas will adopt a supercilious tone and sneer that such behavior would be unbecoming a great nation. Precisely.