Nov 30 2006
A Chechen Connection To Litvinenko’s Death?
New reader Lizarde noticed this truly interesting news item:
A week after the death of Russian spy Alexander Litvinenko from suspected radiation poisoning, the Muswell Hill road in which he lived remained sealed off in two places after traces of radiation were discovered.
Polonium-210 has been found at the 43-year-old’s home in Osier Crescent, off Coppetts Road, where he lived with his wife Marina and their 12-year-old son.
Across the road, a car – believed to be a silver Mercedes belonging to a Russian-speaking neighbour who knew Mr Litvinenko well – had also been cordoned off yesterday with a white and blue tarpaulin placed over it.
So, who lives across the street from Litvinenko? A Chechen rebel leader in exile named Akhmed Zakayev.
Mr Litvinenko’s home, on a newly-built crescent of large middle-class homes in leafy, prosperous Muswell Hill, was under police guard last night.
Officers had erected a tent on the drive outside, covering the front door and Mr Litvinenko’s car. An England flag flew from the first floor balcony.
The crescent is also home to Akhmed Zakayev, the foreign minister of the Chechen government in exile, who lives just opposite Mr Litvinenko.
Berezovsky’s PR mouthpiece Alex Goldfarb implicated Litvinenko, Berezovsky and Zakayevas the true targets for the attack in a recent statement:
British mass media, including The Times, suspect that polonium-210 might have been sent to London by diplomatic mail from Russia, and that employee of Russian consulate in London Anatoly Kirov might have been involved. He arose suspicions first of all because his name was repeatedly mentioned by Litvinenko, who claimed that the diplomat is the intelligence officer spying on him. “Alexander said that Anatoly Kirov controls agent network which is spying on us: Boris Berezovsky, Akhmed Zakaev, Alexander Litvinenko, and me,†said Goldfarb.
It is truly, truly interesting that this car is now a possible site of contamination. Now in all fairness maybe Zakayev drove Litvinenko to the hospital the night he fell ill. So it is too early to over speculate (yes, I know I over speculate all the time). But it would seem this would implicate another possible member of a potential underground movement set to destabilize the West. I mentioned early on there was a possible Chechen connection because Litvinenko and Berezovsky were maniacally determined to claim all the Chechen attacks were actually the work of the Putin government (like the bizarre left here claims Bush-Cheney faked 9-11).
So who is Akhmed Zakayev? He is one very disturbing person:
Akhmed Zakayev, a former actor at Grozny theatre, became a Minister of Culture in the government of Dzokhar Dudayev. After the start of the First Chechen War he left his job and eventually became an important field commander of a Chechen resistance group. His group operated in the South West of the country with its headquarters in the town of Urus-Martan. In August 1996, Zakayev’s group took part in the Chechen recapture of Grozny, where he led the attack on the city’s Central Railway Station.
…
Zakayev was involved in negotiations with Russian representatives before and after the September 1999 Russian offensive. In the course of the Second Chechen War Zakayev briefly fought on the Chechen side. In 2000, after having been wounded, he left for abroad and turned into the most prominent representative of President Maskhadov in Western Europe.
Twice this man took up arms against Russia and allied himself with a Islamic terrorist group responsible for killing hundreds of school children (Beslan Massacre), the Moscow Theatre attack, downing two civilian airlines with bombs, and bombing four apartment buildings. That is like saying Al Qaeda leader Zawhiri is a moderate because he personally never carried out any attacks – he just leads Al Qaeda. He has been personally implicated in the Moscow Theatre attack. So I have my doubts this man is a sainted resistance fighter.
For the Chechens to break free they need to put a wedge between the UK and US and Russia. What better way than to link a nuclear attack back to Putin?
One little addendum: Boris B. maybe drove him to the hospital – see my comment in the post below – thanks for putting all this stuff together
I did read that it was Berezovsky who drove Litvinenko to the hospital.
(I think this theory is not so good either.)
Gaidar update:
“He lost consciousness for three hours and was taken to intensive care for a long time where doctors were fearful for his life,” Gaidar’s daughter Maria, an opposition activist, told Reuters.
“He is in Moscow and doctors are trying to come up with a diagnosis but they can’t find one. His condition is satisfactory and he is speaking but he looks very bad — he looks pale and thin.”
Maria Gaidar said that doctors were trying to diagnose “rather strange symptoms” including a nose bleed and loss of consciousness, but that she did not want to comment on a report in London’s Financial Times that he may been poisoned.
Gaidar, who now heads the Institute for the Economy in Transition, fell ill a day after former Russian spy Alexander Litvinenko died in a London hospital from radiation poisoning. ”
http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20061129/wl_nm/russia_gaidar_illness_dc_2
I remind you that in July Putin was given authority to target people anywhere for assassination; the subjects can be “guilty” of no more than criticizing Putin and he makes that decision alone.
It actually doesn’t make sense to me that Boris drove him to the hospital as the Chechen lived across the street and routinely drove him in the Silver Mercedes – also I don’t think we have heard that Boris’ car has been impounded. L. went home first and then to the hospital – not direct from the offices near Boris. This might be more false info put out by Goldfarb. I am tending toward the theory (for now anyway and without much to go on) that this is a work accident of some sort and involves the Chechens.
interesting comment: wonder what OTHER radiation?
British authorities said they have found evidence of radioactive substances — not necessarily polonium — in numerous London locations, including several airplanes, but experts believe the health risk to the public is minimal.
http://www.iht.com/articles/ap/2006/11/30/europe/EU_MED_Britain_Poisoned_Spy_Polonium.php
I also read that it was Berezovsky who drove him to the hospital so if Zakayev’s car is contaminated, it raises some interesting questions. It is also not so unusual that many people might be in a contaminated area but not be contaminated themselves. Imagine I have a radioactive dust on my hands and clothing. Further imagine that I walk around a room and shed some of those particles. Chances are pretty remote of someone coming into contact with one of those particles and even more remote of them getting it in their mouth. They are most likely to get it on their shoes or the seat or back of their clothing unless hand to hand contact is made with a transfer of particles AND that hand is brought to mouth before washing.
Simple washing with water would remove the contaminant. It would be more difficult to remove from clothing, carpet, furniture, shoes, hair. The thing is that since polonium is such an active alpha emitter, it can be located in the open in very small quantities so tiny particles can be located. This might be like locating a few certain specks of dust on a carpet. The chances of someone contacting that specific speck of dust are remote. The changes of contacting that speck AND getting it into your mouth are even more remote. So that contamination was found in all of these areas and these individuals were not contaminated doesn’t surprise me.
What it does point to is that Litvinenko appeared to be highly contaminated and was shedding the stuff wherever he went. Did Litvinenko meet with Zakayev or borrow his car or get a ride in that car that day? If not, then the contamination of the car is indeed suspicious.
crosspatch–It is interesting to see how easy a disinformation campaign is spun. Litvinenko was a friend to those Chechens who simply wanted liberation from Russia (not the terrorists) and to Berezovsky and a sworn enemy of Putin who Scaramella just told him had placed him on a hit list, and you and AJ are looking FIRST at his allies, not his enemies. You do this even in the face of the obvious assassination and poisoning (one on practically the same day) of Putin opponents. And in the face of a recently passed bit of Russian law allowing Putin on his own to order assassinations of his opponents. Finally, you cling to this despite evidence of radiation traces on planes running to and from London and Russia.
Crosspatch–It is interesting to see how easy a disinformation campaign is spun.
I agree. Especially when the dead man diagnosed himself when doctors weren’t picking it up. And then pointed his finger directly at Putin. As an announcer said on tv…prophetic!
I simply said the car being contaminated was suspicious. It could very well be that someone was trying to kill Zakayev and somehow got a lot of other people contaminated.
I don’t think I am clinging to anything other than the notions that if this was a hit by the Russian intelligence services, I doubt there would be a trail of polonium leading right back to Moscow and that people engaged in trafficing of nuclear material wouldn’t use nuclear material to poison him.
Then I go to who would benefit most from this scenario and it comes down to Islamist terrorists using Chechen allies to deliver a very dangerous material in a very crude fasion. It could even be that the deliverer didn’t even realize they were delivering a poison.
It could be that since deliberate attempts to assassinate in this way are to our knowledge so rare that the assassins made a botch of it. (Why use it then? Perhaps because they didn’t think it would be detected. And it almost wasn’t.)
I’m curious. What’s your theory on Gaidar whose illness also cannot be diagnosed? Did he smuggle goats to the Chechens? Sit on the wrong plane? Annoy the oligarchy?
or is the Gaidar story a red herring – remember he was well enough to get himself back to Moscow – he went willingly knowing about the L case. Various news accounts have him getting better or getting worse.
Well, I’m not there so I can’t give you a first hand report, but the doctors cannot diagnose why he lost consciousness for three hours, is bleeding from the nose, etc–symptoms which seem alarming and which his daughter calls evidence of poisoning. Fox reports that he and Litvinenko had used the same bodyguard.(I’ve not seen this elsewhere.)
Given his former high position, I do suspect the best doctors in Moscow are treating him not the usual shleps who treat the masses.
I reported on the body guard story days ago – it is Lugovoy who was in the NINETIES the body guard for the sick guy not recently- Lugovoy met with L. at the Millenium then travelled back to Moscow Nov. 3 etc. Lugovoy seems to have set up a protection business in London for local Russian expats or something.
the consequences are causing waves:
“We can’t handle one radiation incident, let alone someone exploding a dirty bomb,” John Large, an independent nuclear expert, told Reuters.
http://today.reuters.co.uk/news/articlenews.aspx?type=topNews&storyID=2006-11-30T183501Z_01_L29570112_RTRUKOC_0_UK-BRITAIN-POISONING.xml&pageNumber=2&imageid=&cap=&sz=13&WTModLoc=NewsArt-C1-ArticlePage2
No idea. But I believe that if he was poisoned, whatever was used on him seems to have been pretty effective so far in evading detection or at least evading public release of what the agent is. If it has any connection with the other case, why use different poisons on different people? Why not just use one? Polonium is really nasty for lots of reasons. First of all, as we have seen, unless it is handled carefully it gets all over the place. Secondly if other people get a non-lethal dose, they are likely to get cancer from it. Polonium is one of the most potent carcinogens that exists.
It is the polonium in the quantity and form in this case that I am most worried about, not the drama surrounding everything. Polonium is manufactured in only very small quantities. In the UK, for example, there is only one reactor that produces it. It isn’t something someone can manufacture without the knowledge of the operator of the reactor because the bismuth must be placed in the reactor and then refined afterward to extract the polonium. The only clandestine manufacture of polonium that I am aware of in the past several years has been done by Iran.
A Russian intelligence service, even if they used ant poison to kill someone, probably wouldn’t dispatch someone directly from Russia, meet with the target, poison the person, and send the killer directly back to Russia leaving a trail of any poison behind. That is insane. Even a numbskull would know to change their clothes and take a shower first. And that we have so many planes now showing contamination says that most, if not all, of the contamination is likely to be co-lateral contamination. In other words, people who were themselves contaminated by Litvinenko spreading the contamination even further. I don’t believe there were 5 killers who took 5 different planes and the contaminated people didn’t even need direct contact with Litvinenko to pick up and spread the contamination, they simply needed to have crossed his path at some point.
So I am focused on the poison itself … polonium … where did it come from, how much of it is “out there”, who has access to it, who would benefit from the use of such a poison. It is like killing someone with nitroglycerin … imagine having to walk around with this bottle of nitro in your pocket.
Whoever used this poison in the way it was apparently used could not have been overly concerned with their own safety and that brings jihadis immediately to mind.
crosspatch – a couple of words: liquids/planes from London/mixing in the bathroom/we don’t have them all – can’t get this out of my head though could be just a big coincidence.
I don’t know either, but to our knowledge the recent killings/ poisonings of Putin’s enemies have each used a different method. And some–like the one used on Yevshenko and Litvienko–have been very exotic.
I’m not saying we shouldn’t consider other perps, but I do think we have to exclude more definitively the obvious perp before jumping all over the place, and Putin is still the obvious perp.
Correction:And some–like the oneS used on Yevshenko and LitviNenko–have been very exotic
If Putin were trying to kill me, the last place I would go for treatment is Russia.
Let me put it this way … I am a Russian former PM, I am travelling abroad and fall ill under mysterious circumstances. Now if Putin wanted me dead, wouldn’t it be MUCH easier for him to poison me in Russia … on his own turf … than in Ireland? In Russia he would have some influence on any investigation or the potential exists to influence or have cronies influence any investigation.
If I suspected I were poisoned by Putin, I certainly wouldn’t run back to Russia for treatment. I would check in to a hospital in Europe or go to the US but I would *NOT* under any circumstances go to Russia. This guy went to Russia which means that he at least does not at all suspect Putin to have any role in it.
It looks to me like someone is going out of their way to be very messy with all of this because I don’t think the Keystone Kops could be any worse.