By Ben Kerrigan-
Russia has been asked to pay a huge sum of money to the wife of Alexander Litvinenko, after the European Court of Human Rights (ECHR) concluded he was murdered in an evil plot by the state.
Litvinenko, a former Russian spy who became a British citizen, was fatally poisoned with radioactive polonium-210 in London in 2006, with an inquiry conducted a decade later concluding that the killing was “probably approved” by Russian President Vladimir Putin.
AD: Capeesh Restaurant
Litvinenko’s widow, Marina, took the case against Russia to the Strasbourg-based rights court, which has now formally agreed with the UK inquiry’s conclusion. The UK inquiry said former KGB bodyguard Andrei Lugovoi and another Russian, Dmitry Kovtun deliberately poisoned Mr Litvinenko, probably by putting the radioactive substance into his tea.
“The court found in particular that there was a strong prima facie case that, in poisoning Mr Litvinenko, Mr Lugovoi and Mr Kovtun had been acting as agents of the Russian state,” the ECHR ruled.
It concluded that Russia’s failure to refute claims that it had organised the killing further pointed towards the state’s responsibility.
AD: Oysterian Sea Food Restaurant And Bar
Both Mr Lugovoi and Mr Kovtun have denied any involvement in the killing.
The Strasbourg rights court found it had established “beyond reasonable doubt” that the pair had carried out the poisoning, from the complex procurement of “rare, deadly poison”, to the travel arrangements and the repeated and sustained attempts to poison Litvinenko.
Litvinenko had fled Russia, where he had been an officer with the FSB security service. He became a fierce critic of Putin and was reportedly investigating Russian mafia links with Spain, doing so under the pay of M16.
Rogue Operation Implausible
The ECHR found that if his murder had been a “rogue operation” then Russia would have been able to prove that. But the court said no serious attempt was made to disprove the findings of the UK authorities.
Although it said Russia should pay Litvinenko’s widow €122,500 (£105,000; $144,000) in costs and other damages, it rejected her claim for punitive damages
Polonium-210 is a rare material, produced in a reactor that emits alpha rays, not gamma rays. These are too weak to penetrate the skin but if ingested they are lethal, breaking down the cell walls, causing multiple organ failure.
In Litvinenko’s case it was only discovered, too late, in his urine and the precise source identified by nuclear scientists from the Atomic Weapons Establishment at Aldermaston in Berkshire.
The ECHR’s ruling that Russia was behind this murder will come as no surprise to those who have already investigated it.
AD: Heritage And Restaurant Lounge Bar