Alexander Litvinenko

1962 - 23 November 2006. Exiled Russian former security officer who died of Polonium poisoning in London.

Background

Born in Voronezh, south-west Russia, he joined the army out of school, rising to the rank of lieutenant colonel. Then, in the dying days of the Soviet Union in 1988, he entered the counter-intelligence department of the KGB.

In 1991, once the KGB's directorates had split up, he worked for the federal security service (FSB), fighting terrorism and organised crime, sometimes operating in Chechnya. In 1997 he moved to one of the most secret divisions of the service, a unit called URPO investigating "organised criminal formations".

Boris Berezovsky

It is understood that he had special responsibility for countering attempts by the Russian mafia to infiltrate the security services. In 1998, he declared his failure at this task. At a press conference he accused the FSB, then headed by Mr Putin, of ordering him to assassinate Mr Berezovsky. In turn charged with corruption by Moscow, Mr Litvinenko fled to London and continued his onslaught with a book, The FSB Blows Up Russia, in which he accused his former employers of murdering 300 people in 1999 by demolishing apartment blocks with explosives and blaming the attacks on Chechen rebels.

Mitrokhin Commission

In December 2003, Litvinenko was approached by Mario Scaramella to take part in the Mitrokhin Commission, which aimed to link left-wing Italian politicians to the KGB.

The commission was a meal ticket and would enable him to see more of his brother, Maxim, who had fled Russia before him and was living in Senigallia, a small Italian port on the Adriatic coast. Litvinenko's only concern was about the value of the information he had to bring to the table. In the FSB, he'd had no connection with the foreign wing and no knowledge of its network of recruits in abroad, the people who were to be the focus of the commission.

To back him up, he took along a new contact he had made through the Berezovsky circle, Evgeni Limarev, also a Russian exile, who lived in France and was the son of a high-ranking KGB officer.

Targets of the Mitrokhin Commission included former Italian Prime Ministers Romano Prodi and Massimo D'Alema, Green Party leader Alfonso Pecoraro Scanio, other senior politicians, intelligence officials and judges, as well as journalists from La Repubblica.

Romano Prodi

Litvinenko had no compunction in recalling a piece of gossip he had been told by a former KGB deputy director as he fled Russia. In 2000, General Anatoly Trofimov had warned Litvinenko not to go to Rome since "Prodi is our man in Italy". He was referring to Romano Prodi, the former Italian prime minister who went on to become president of the European Commission.

Now Litvinenko regurgitated the unfounded claim to Scaramella who persuaded him to write it down.

On 29 March 2006, Litvinenko met UKIP MEP Gerald Batten at the Itsu restaurant in London. Four days later, with an Italian general election imminent, Batten called for an Inquiry into Prodi in the European Parliament. Prodi responded by threatening to sue Litvinenko and Scaramella. In the resulting controversy, Silvio Berlusconi was forced to wind up the Mitrokhin Commission, and Prodi won the election.

The Imam Rapito Affair

Litvinenko, Limarev and Scaramella met in Italy with Robert Seldon Lady, a CIA agent posted as a political officer to the US consulate in Milan. Lady was allegedly involved in the so-called Imam Rapito affair, the kidnapping of Egyptian cleric Hassan Mustafa Osama Nasr. The Mitrokhin Commission investigated allegations that the prosecutor in the case, Armando Spataro, had secret links to the KGB.

Semion Mogilevich

Litvinenko and Scaramella clamed that Semion Mogilevich, a Ukrainian organised crime boss, had extensive links to the Putin government in Russia.

Alexander Talik

In October 2005, Litvinenko accused Ukrainian Alexander Talik of being an FSB agent in Italy with links to Mogilevich. Talik claimed he had been framed after refusing to provide information to Scaramella.

In the same month, Litvinenko and Scaramella gave Italian police details of a plot to Kill Litvinenko's borther Maxim. In November Litvinenko released the story in the Ukrainian press. By now the Italian police had begun tapping the phones of Litvinenko, Scaramella and Talik.

Alexander Lugovoi

In January 2006, Litvinenko attended Boris Berezovsky's birthday party at Blenheim Palace. He was seated with Alexander Lugovoi, who, according to The Guardian was a former KGB and FSB colleague of Alexander Talik. Livinenko reportedly told Alex Goldfarb that he had agreed to become Lugovoi's man in London.

Limarev claims

In October 2006, Evegeni Limarev]] sent Scaramella a series of emails claiming that the Russians were out to kill everyone connected with the Mitrokhin Commission. These emails were reportedly the subject of Scaramella's final meeting with Litvinenko.

Polonium poisoning

Litvinenko was poisoned with the radioactive substance polonium at some time on or around 1 November 2006.

Millennium Hotel Meeting

The first, at 10am, was at the Millennium Mayfair Hotel in central London with Sergei Lugovoy, a former KGB bodyguard and businessman who runs a security company in Moscow. Mr Lugovoy said he had been in London to watch a football match between Arsenal and CSKA Moscow. Also at the meeting were two other people unknown to Mr Litvinenko Dmitry Kovtun, the business partner of Mr Lugovoy, and another friend and partner named as Vyacheslav Sokolenko. Friends of Mr Litvinenko insist that he drank tea during the meeting.

Itsu restaurant meeting

By 3pm, Mr Litvinenko had moved from Mayfair to the elegant façades of Piccadilly, where he met Mario Scaramella, another long-standing contact who had called him out of the blue saying he wanted to bring forward a meeting planned for 10 November to discuss important documents. The Italian examining magistrate who, among his many job descriptions, includes the titles of environmental campaigner and law professor, told Mr Litvinenko that he had received a death threat aimed at both of them. They met for 35 minutes in the basement of a branch of Itsu, a sushi restaurant chain. Mr Scaramella said last week that, while he himself drank only water, Mr Litvinenko bought food and drink from a chiller cabinet.

Final Days

After three days of sickness and stomach pains Mr Litvinenko was admitted to Barnet General Hospital, north London on 4 November. On 17 November he was transferred to University College Hospital under armed guard as his condition worsened.

Affiliations

• Federalnaya Sluzhba Bezopasnosti
• Mitrokhin Commission

Connections

• Marina Litvinenko - Wife
• Boris Berezovsky
• Mario Scaramella
• Andrei Lugovoy
• Dmitry Kovtun
• Vyacheslav Sokolenko
• Akhmed Zakayev
• Tim Bell
• Alex Goldfarb
• Mikhail Trepashkin
• Yuri Felshtinsky
• Andrey Nekrasov
• Evgeni Limarev