UK judge: Putin ‘probably approved’ killing of ex-KGB agent

LONDON – Almost a decade after former KGB officer Alexander Litvinenko lay dying in a London hospital bed, a British judge has concluded who poisoned him: two Russian men, acting at the behest of Russia’s security services, probably with approval from President Vladimir Putin.

That finding prompted sharp exchanges Thursday between London and Moscow. With Russia and the West inching closer together after years of strain, neither side wants a new feud – even over a state-sanctioned murder on British soil.

Judge Robert Owen, who led the public inquiry into the killing, said he was certain two Russians with links to the security services had given Litvinenko green tea containing a fatal dose of radioactive polonium-210 during a meeting at a London hotel. He said there was a “strong probability” Russia’s FSB, the successor to the Soviet Union’s KGB spy agency, directed the killing and the operation was “probably approved” by Putin.

Before he died, Litvinenko accused Putin of ordering his killing, but Owen’s report is the first public official statement linking the Russian president to the crime, and it sent a chilling jolt through U.K.-Russia relations.

British Prime Minister David Cameron said the evidence in the report of “state-sponsored” killing was “absolutely appalling.” Britain summoned the Russian ambassador for a dressing-down and imposed an asset freeze on the two main suspects: Andrei Lugovoi, now a Russian lawmaker, and Dmitry Kovtun.

Putin spokesman Dmitry Peskov told reporters the “quasi-investigation” would “further poison the atmosphere of our bilateral relations.”

He said the report “cannot be accepted by us as a verdict.”

Russian Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Maria Zhakarova said the British inquiry was neither public nor transparent, saying it had turned into a “shadow puppet theater.”

“There was one goal from the beginning: slander Russia and slander its officials,” she told reporters in Moscow.

Litvinenko fled to Britain in 2000 and became a critic of Russia’s security services and of Putin, whom he accused of links to organized crime and other alleged transgressions including pedophilia, Owen said in the report. He was a vocal annoyance, feeding inside information about Russia’s secrets to Western intelligence services, and – the judge said – was widely regarded within the FSB as a traitor.

“There were powerful motives for organizations and individuals within the Russian state to take action against Mr. Litvinenko, including killing him,” Owen wrote in the 326-page report.

The judge said the case for Russian state involvement was circumstantial but strong. Owen said Litvinenko had “personally targeted President Putin himself with highly personal public criticism,” allied himself with Putin’s opponents and was believed to be working for British intelligence.

U.K.-Russian relations have remained chilly since the killing of Litvinenko, and worsened with Russia’s involvement in the separatist fighting in Ukraine.

In his report, the judge laid out the overwhelming scientific evidence against Lugovoi and Kovtun, including a trail of radiation that stretched from the hotel teapot to the sink in Kovtun’s room and even to Emirates Stadium.

Litvinenko died after three agonizing weeks in which his hair fell out, he vomited blood and his organs failed. A urine test conducted by a doctor on a hunch shortly before Litvinenko’s death revealed the presence of polonium-210, an isotope that is deadly if ingested in tiny quantities.

He lapsed into unconsciousness Nov. 22, 2006, after telling his wife he loved her, and died the next day. His body was so radioactive that he was buried in a lead-lined coffin in London’s Highgate Cemetery.