Nov 28 2006
Litvinenko Admitted Smuggling Of Nuclear Contraband
Well, well – seems I was close to the truth on this one, if the reporting from the Independent is to be believed:
Alexander Litvinenko, the poisoned former Russian agent, told the Italian academic he met on the day he fell ill that he had organised the smuggling of nuclear material out of Russia for his security service employers.
…
In an interview with The Independent shortly after the poisoning became public, Mr Scaramella said that Mr Litvinenko, a friend and professional contact since 2001, told him he had masterminded the smuggling of radioactive material to Zurich in 2000.
Mario Scaramella, who flew into London yesterday to be interviewed by Scotland Yard officers investigating Mr Litvinenko’s death, said Mr Litvinenko told him about the operation for the FSB security service, the successor to the KGB.
More as I review the material, but I said early on this seemed less like an assassination and more like the accidental disclosure of a smuggling operation. I would guess the fact the Chechen Islamo Fascists praised Litvinenko as a martyr that the smuggling was for their benefit or Al Qaeda’s.
If you want to know what I suspect it has to do with this company located at one of the two new contamination sites. It has abosutely no public information whatsoever. Looks like a front company to me. What company doesn’t advertise? Note: Someone did a search for me on this company and it supposedly has two directors and looks like a very small SW company of some sort – basically nothing jumps out. Probably a dead end.
Update: I found a timeframe for the meeting at the Sushi Bar with Sacaramella. It is 30-45 minutes (while Litvinenko ate). While that might give enough time for Litvinenko to go to Berezovsky’s office and then onto the 4:30 meeting at the Mayfair (60-45 minutes) it in now way gives enough time to go to Berezovsky’s office, some place at 58 Grosvenor Lane and the Sheraton Park Lane Hotel. Now not all three may have been done in that window, but it is still tough to get all that done in what I would say is a 45 minute meeting/lunch. The timeline is key to the Polonium trail and the original location of the contamination (which may not be the place where Litvinenko accidentally ingested the Polonium).
Update: OK, here is my quick take. Litvinenko was a spy – he would say what he needed to and would mix truth and fiction to meet his needs and manipulate people. My guess is the information Scaramella had was Litvinenko was targetted because of smuggling charges (and not for death). Litvinenko made up the dodge to his friend that it was ‘old news’ from his KGB days – admitting and not admitting to the charges. I would wager Litvinenko was smuggling nuclear material, possibly for Berezovsky or someone else, and that is why he had to defect – he was uncovered. Clearly we have a situation that represents a grave problem if looked at in a certain light. We have a turncoat KGB agent who admitted to smuggling nuclear material out of Russia (ignore who he says it was for, he would never divulge the truth) who was poisoned be contamination from contraband nuclear material. This ain’t rocket science folks. And it is not a Putin led assassination attempt.
Previous posts on this subject:
How To Kill A Spy
Litvenenko’s Death Staged As A Political Murder?
How To Play The Media
Litvenenko, Berezovsky & WMDs
Chechen’s Salute Fallen Comrade, Litvenenko
Italian Contact Of Litvinenko Has Nuclear Ties
Chechen’s Used Nuclear Dirty Bomb In 1995
UK’s COBRA An Ominous Sign
The Polonium Trail – With Updates
Alexander Goldfarb Slips Up
The Trail, And Poison, Spread In Litvinenko Case
Polonium Trail Gets More Complicated
— I would wager Litvinenko was smuggling nuclear material, possibly for Berezovsky or someone else, and that is why he had to defect – he was uncovered. —
Well, I am not sure about smuggling for Berezovsky, but everything else sounds plausible. If Scaramella had info on his nuke smuggling, and received the info recently (hence the moved up meeting) — seems someone else knew too (A- they emailed Scaramella and B- the info made Litvinenko a target)
Claudia Rosset notes:
http://claudiarosett.pajamasmedia.com/2006/11/25/what_to_do.php
Also, I’m not sure there would be a Cobra powpow for Berezovsky, but someone or entity more serious enough to warrant it. It may be a global network of civilian connected to terror groups organ that needed to target Litvinenko.
TSK9,
COBRA would be initiated at any threat of nuclear material in the UK under clandestine circumstances. And Russia would never waste their time on Berezovsky or Litvinenko. But conversely Berezovsky and Litvinenko could do a lot of damage to Russia’s relations to the west with a planted nuclear material with ties back to Russia.
Never dismiss the simplest, obvious explanation.
AJ
I don’t dismiss it, just seems like the choice of weapon is almost too obvious for either obvious suspect – Berezovsky and Putin – it left a trail.
Could be Chechens, but I am starting to think this “killer(s)” is anonymous and chose Polonium-210 because it would start exactly what it has (Berezovsky and Putin) and seems to me the group that has the most to loose or more to protect, is the network of nuke traders (and that could mean a big global network)
BTW
I thank you for keep up on the subject. Really is a real time thiller.
Another take on the Spy…
Strata-Sphere has a totally different take on what you’ve heard about Alexander Litvienenko, the deceased ex-Russian spy.
……
TSK9
I believe it has nothing to do with Berezovsky, Putin, or any ring of nuke traders … why would they use their own contraband to kill and therefor draw closer attention to themselves? He was killed because his death would cause world wide attention. I still believe this was simply a high-profile demonstration that someone has polonium-210 and is prepared to use it.
I don’t doubt that the Chechens might have done it because A: they had access to him and B: his future utility to them was probably limited and he would be more “useful” as a weapons demonstration. But in my harebrained scenario, it is al Qaida ordering the Chechens to do it in order to convey a threat or terrorize the UK leadership. A “dirty bomb” using polonium-120 would be a scary scenario indeed and someone has just “telegraphed” that such a scenario is indeed possible.
— why would they use their own contraband to kill and therefor draw closer attention to themselves? —
Good point. And I agree with all of your points…although, if it was just a demonstration then it’s been slightly more overshadowed by the Russian drama.
Also, is it possible Litvinenko was now working for another country – Britain or any other?
I do think the accidental exposure manipulated into a dart at Putin is still in play too. Whether Litvinenko was still involved in that activity or investigating it – who knows.
But I appreciate the points you raised CrossP.
It’s interesting that polonium is extraordinarily dangerous, even in miniscule amounts, “requiring specialized equipment and strict handling procedures (wikipedia).” Doesn’t that make it harder for a poisoner to administer it safely in a direct fashion? The fact that there seem to be traces of it over a wide area suggests that strict handling procedures weren’t used. And perhaps that lends credence to an “accidental” contamination–at least this: a safe transfer of a contaminated source (a document in a sealed container?) was effected, and when the polonium was transfered to L.’s hands it was later transferred to food and ingested? I dunno, just speculating.
The following is the text of report by Chechenpress news agency web site headlined “Their aim is to replace Maskhadov’s circle”.
Ironically, the Chechenpress website skips November 2003 in their archives.
Chechenpress web site, Tbilisi, in Russian 10 Nov 03
Dear Vagap!
Today I read very closely your article “We must be mindful of the things which both our friends and enemies can see” on the Chechenpress web site.
Permit me, as a friend, to give my reaction to what you had to say. As I understand it, your enemies have already shown you respect by allowing you to travel through Chechen territory, to visit Moscow, to obtain a new Russian passport and a visa to enter France and to cross without hindrance the state border of the Russian Federation via Sheremetyevo-2 airport, something which not a single member of the lawful government of the Chechen Republic of Ichkeria CRI has been able to do since the start of the second Chechen war. None, that is, apart from those who have started collaborating with Putin’s criminal regime.
Let me make it clear from the outset that this will be a tough letter. But as friends we must look each other straight in the eye, speak the truth and nothing but the truth, answer the most unpleasant questions and, of course, not play the hypocrite or tell lies. THERE’S A WAR ON!
Where do I fundamentally disagree with you? First, the fact that you have combined your official duties as representative of the CRI parliament within the PACE. Why did you do that? You say that half the members of parliament have betrayed their duty and entered into a criminal deal with Putin, calling for the “impeachment” of the lawfully elected President Aslan Maskhadov and thereby violating the constitution of the CRI. What do you have to do with it? Perhaps you will be proposing, to the delight of your enemies, that Maskhadov himself follows your example and tenders his resignation, too?
I fail to understand your logic. What could you hope to achieve by resigning and thereby relinquishing your powers? To satisfy your moral principles or, perhaps, you are hoping that Russian presidential aide Sergey Yastrzhembskiy and chairman of the Russian parliament’s International Affairs Committee Dmitriy Rogozin will ask you to remain in office in exchange for an immediate end to aggression? You reckoned that a second half of members of parliament would remain who, in spite of everything, would continue to carry out their duties and become a symbol of an independent Chechen state. Perhaps you need to remember how the parliament’s speaker, Ruslan Alikhadzhiyev, was killed. The executioners from the Russian Federal Security Service FSB also, very likely, suggested that he give up his powers when they murdered him in the torture chamber.
Let me quote from your article: “Today, as four years of work come to an end, we have a wonderful opportunity to analyse the work of all the state services, particularly abroad, based on their reports, recommendations and proposals which have been at the basis of the decisions which have been adopted over four years by the CRI leadership, and send them all to a military tribunal. Then we must get down to rebuilding our attributes and the system of statehood, power structures and departments, and filling the vacancies which have arisen in the state power bodies. If we waste these attributes we will lose our statehood, and we are now on the brink of this. One more step and we will find ourselves on the scrap heap of history, and there we can prattle on as much as we like to try to justify ourselves, but this justifies nobody. History does not forgive show-offs.”
You maintain that the CRI has forfeited its attributes, its system of statehood, power structures and departments and you propose to rebuild them, first committing each and every representative of the Chechen state to a military tribunal. I would like to remind you that President Aslan Maskhadov and those members of parliament who refused to call for his “impeachment” are also in the service of the Chechen state, and they would also be eligible to be sent to your “military tribunal”. I am sorry, but even those who called for the so-called “impeachment” of Aslan Maskhadov did not say he should be immediately brought to trial. This is a very serious statement and it seems to me that you should name all those whom you suspect of treason and point out the precise details of the crimes they have committed. If you believe that your voluntary resignation, as one of the representatives of the CRI’s power structures abroad (as I understand it, you stress representatives abroad), will save you from a military tribunal, then you also come into the category “each and every” and I, as one who knows something about jurisprudence, would like to warn you that treason has no time limit in wartime. So my advice to you, dear Vagap, is to begin with yourself.
Now, as regards your assessment of the Chechen war situation and world politics. Where did you get the idea that we are moving in the wrong direction, that we are afraid to speak the truth, that people don’t trust us, and that we are engaging in self-delusion, empty talk and political unscrupulousness? Of course, not everything is going as one would wish, but you have to be realistic and understand that the West and the USA will not recognize Chechen independence straight away, they will not declare war on Russia over Chechnya, and they must think of themselves, first and foremost.
To demand such results from the government’s foreign wing is like asking those who are fighting in the mountains to immediately take Moscow and capture Putin. But President Maskhadov, whether Putin and the Russian chekists like it or not, has not been declared a terrorist. The world community has not recognized the so-called “president” Kadyrov, either, despite all Russia’s efforts, it has condemned the farce under the title of “referendum on a new constitution” and it has not sent observers to a single Kremlin event.
World public opinion absolutely condemns Russia’s aggression in Chechnya. With every day that passes, it becomes more and more difficult for Putin and his ministers to explain to the Western man-in-the-street the unjustified cruelty of the Russian army in Chechnya, and only a blind man can fail to see that time is on our side. The fact that the Russian army is completely tied down in Chechnya and that Western public opinion condemns this cruel, crazy war and genocide means that, in the long-term, those who arranged this senseless barbarity on European territory at the beginning of the 21st century will be buried by it.
In order to justify the start of the aggression and to put off the failure of a hopelessly lost military campaign, the Russian authorities are trying to present the justifiable struggle of a small people against a huge empire as an example of “international terrorism”. To achieve this, the Kremlin authorities, with the aid of their special services, have carried out a series of terrorist acts against their own people. But, despite all the accusations made against the Chechens, few people in the world, or in Russia itself, still doubt that the blowing up of houses in Russia’s cities and the seizure of the hostages at the Nord-Ost theatre in Moscow was the work of the Russian special services.
Proof of these crimes against two peoples – Chechen and Russian – has been collated and brought to the attention of the world only through the joint efforts of Russian rights organizations, representatives of the media, lawyers, politicians and private citizens both inside and outside Russia. Chechen journalists and law-enforcement officers, as well as Aslan Maskhadov’s official representatives in the West and in the USA, have been standing shoulder to shoulder in this work with their counterparts in Russia.
At the same time, I have to say that exposing the true culprits of these monstrous crimes has been no less dangerous than being on the battlefield itself. Since 1999 many of our friends have been killed, such as deputies Sergey Yushenkov and Yuriy Shchekochikhin. The lawyer Mikhail Trepashkin was unlawfully arrested and is now in prison on a fabricated charge under threat of his life.
I will not name those people who had to abandon their homeland and were deprived of the chance even to return home for a short time as part of an international delegation. Nor those who are being “hunted” or are in the dock awaiting a sentence of extradition into the clutches of the FSB. Nor those sought by Interpol and interrogated even after being granted political asylum from the Russian authorities. Nor those whom they failed to break in the prisons, who were tortured, beaten up in doorways or on the dark streets. Is that not enough? What else have they done?
It’s tough, and it’s dangerous, but no-one gave us the right to create hysteria and demand the wholesale change and the military tribunal of everyone without exception, without finding the time even to explain to the people what they are accused of before their country and their people. Painstaking work and treachery are two completely different things, and I absolutely agree with you when you point out that we are often more intolerant of one another than we are of our enemies.
Summing up the situation in Chechnya, I believe that it is developing in a positive way, perhaps not as quickly as one would like, but the main thing is that it is going in the right direction. I have always said, and I repeat: “Nothing is ever resolved on impulse, we must prepare for a siege.” This means that we must every day work out quietly, without hysteria, a system of confrontation with the criminal regime both in Chechnya and in Russia, and also in the developed countries of Europe and the USA. Not prosecute people, but quite the contrary – to thoroughly select and train specialists to work abroad and thus create a prototype of a future foreign ministry. To establish lasting contacts with all vigorous forces, so as to publicly, in parliaments, in the courts, the newspapers and television, and in private meetings with representatives of the Western media, public organizations and business circles, prove our case, and to find among them reliable friends and partners. And through encouraging public opinion we must seek from the leaders of the West and the USA a just and principled appraisal of the criminal activities of the Russian leadership in the CRI.
Our ultimate goal is to end the war, to replace the Russian troops with peacekeeping forces to maintain order, and to win the international recognition of the CRI as an independent state, after which it will be possible to bring to book all those guilty of genocide, murder and other crimes against the Chechen state and its citizens.
I repeat once again that this is extremely painstaking work which will require a great deal of time and energy, since these tasks cannot be solved on impulse. One must understand the realities of our times, and that the centres of world politics are situated in the West and the USA, and whether we like it or not, it will be in the West that an end will be brought to the 400 years of confrontation between Russia and Chechnya. They know this full well in the Kremlin, and it is not by chance that we are hearing more and more frequently statements by Russian officials about the resurrection deep within the Russian special services of so-called “death squadrons” for the physical elimination of the leaders of the Chechen Resistance and those who support them in western Europe and the USA.
That is why there is no end to the list of provocations against representatives of the Chechen state, such as “The attempt on Putin’s life”, which I myself came up against quite recently, and the threat of physical reprisals against those who are not yet under the control of the Russian special services.
Now, dear Vagap, permit me to put some questions to you which have interested me a lot and which were not answered by your interview. Can you explain, in more detail, what you mean by a “war within Ichkeria”, and how ending it might put a stop to Russian aggression on the territory of the CRI “without any particular problems and in the shortest possible time”?
Can you put a name to all the “real authors” of the notion and the scenario of the talks between Chechen MPs Temirov, Atayev, and Tsomayev and Putin’s administration? Who are they who are dressed up in “patriotic cassocks” and brandishing traitors loudest of all? It seems, I am not the only one who would like to know. Can you give the names of those in the Kremlin administration who proposed a meeting with you when you were in Moscow, and what did these people want from you as an official representative of the CRI?
Can you publish a full list of those CRI officials you suspect of crimes against the state and also those whose activities have harmed the cause of Chechnya’s becoming an independent state? Please let us know what, in your opinion, an official has been charged with, or state how he has discredited himself and why he needs to be brought before a military tribunal.
In conclusion, I would like to share with you certain matters, as a former FSB officer who knows something about the way they work. For four years now, the main task of Putin and his circle has been to break the resistance of the Chechens once and for all, to bring them to their knees and to rid them of the idea of independence. To achieve this the Russian special services are trying to kill President Maskhadov, to drive a wedge in the Resistance movement, to set its leaders against each other and then to bring about a civil war between the Chechens and blame it on all the victims of the occupation, thus shirking themselves of all responsibility for the genocide and crimes against humanity which they have committed in the CRI.
They will not succeed in killing Maskhadov because the FSB and the other Russian special services have no decent secret agents in the Chechen president’s immediate circle. So, logically, this means that they are trying to replace his circle by means of a secret operation. So, my dear Vagap, whatever happens, they have chosen you in the role of “Judas”, so be vigilant and do not allow yourself to be used by unscrupulous individuals, narrow-minded pedants, toadies, adventurists and rogues of all hues who, in your words, continue to take advantage of the state of uncertainty brought about by the military situation.
In addition, I would like to remind you of the category of those people about whom you, for some reason, keep silent. These are the SECRET AGENTS OF THE FSB and other RUSSIAN SPECIAL SERVICES capitals as given . It is they above all the categories of riff-raff who are most partial to the idea of sending to a military tribunal the whole of Maskhadov’s government, headed by Maskhadov himself, something which probably even Putin, Patrushev and their “mouthpieces” Yastrzhembskiy and Shabalkin had not even dreamed of.
Forgive me for taking such a tough tone in my letter, but as you yourself said, THERE’S A WAR ON!
Yours sincerely,
Aleksandr Litvinenko
SBD
AJ
Your link registration info is here and might be(?) this person (?)
Elendil–someone else has speculated that the document handed Litvinenko at the restaurant was contaminated. A reporter on Fox said Litvinenko expressed surprise that Scaramella insisted on flying to London to hand it to him instead of simply transmitting it by email.
We really are in the dark. There’s too much we don’t know. Scaramella BTW is held in high repute.
Let me amend that: doesn’t the fact that there seem to be traces of polonium along an extended trail suggest that someone tracked it around unwittingly–since only someone who was suicidal would do that wittingly? For example, whoever spread it, presumably Litvinenko, opened some container without knowing that polonium was inside? This scenario could work both ways: an accident, or a faked/planned accident.
Yes. What I was thinking of is, what would be a safe means of transfer, that is, for the deliverer If the container is opened in the presence of the deliverer, would that be potentially fatal for both? Risky. At a sushi bar I would expect everyone to be pretty close to one another, so maybe that would suggest the transfer taking place somewhere else where it might be plausible to tell L., here, take it with you and open it in private somewhere.
also, the domain name (that is weirdly named different that the web content company name)
Eagle Flight Factory – http://eagleflightfactory.com/ Producers of the Reflex paraglider wing, the Vortex paramotor, spare parts and accessories also offer …
Link
Which I think to be hang-glinding.
Another coincidence?
“Yegor Gaidar, Russia’s former prime minister and the architect of the country’s market reforms, last week suffered a sudden, unexplained and violent illness on a visit to Ireland, a day after Alexander Litvinenko, a former KGB spy, died in London from an apparent radiation poisoning.
Mr Gaidar is now in a stable condition at an undisclosed Moscow hospital, undergoing tests. In a telephone interview with the FT, Mr Gaidar said the doctors had so far been unable to identify the cause of the violent vomiting and bleeding that he suffered during a conference in Ireland.
Anatoly Chubais, his former associate and the head of Russia’s electricity monopoly, said he suspected Mr Gaidar may have been poisoned. However, he strongly ruled out that either Russia’s security services or the Kremlin could have had any involvement. There is no indication of radiation being the cause of his illness.
Mr Gaidar is one of Russian President Vladimir Putin’s softer critics and his daughter is a leader of an opposition movement. Mr Gaidar, who heads an economic think-tank in Moscow, has close connections with the government and occasionally advises them on economic matters. ”
http://www.ft.com/cms/s/1bc23f9c-7f21-11db-b193-0000779e2340.html
OK…with the billionaire dude an a car accident in France and now:
Mystery illness hits former Russian PM
slightly weird.
Elendil–there does seem to be a missing three hours between the newsstand and the sushi–and , again, look at the map and note how close to all these venues the Russian Embassy is.
No, not another coincidence.
I predicted the Islamists would send signal after signal to get the West to fracture and run from the middle east. Who benefits from this? Not Putin and not the West.
Violent vomiting and bleeding sounds just like what happened in the US recently to people who ate packaged spinach. In other words, e coli poisoning. Might just be food poisoning.
I believe polonium incident could be accidental exposure but doubt it. More likely it is one part that is visible in a larger drama that is playing out hidden from the public. Might involve some larger issues such as Israel’s sudden ceasefire in Gaza, Jordan’s king playing sudden peacemaker and making comments about the possibility of eruption of major hostilities in days, etc.
A secret ultimatum or warning or threat could have been delivered and this guy used to back that up as a demonstration that they are serious.
If it was accidental exposure then it is probably a very lucky for us at the expense of the Russian.
Ment to say “it is probably a very lucky break for us …”