2
POPSLitvinenko Murder Suspect Lugovoy Makes Peace Offer “What was beneficial for Russia out of this situation? Russia didn’t gain anything from it,” he insisted. The Director of Public Prosecutions has ruled that Scotland Yard had sufficient evidence to charge Mr Lugovoy with murder. The pair are clearly frustrated at their position. Mr Lugovoy cannot travel outside Russia for fear of arrest; Mr Kovtun’s status remains uncertain because of the German inquiry.
1
POPSThe Russians Have Always Favored Overkill Vladimir Putin had ordered the assassination of Russian journalists and capitalists before Litvinenko, of course. But the Litvinenko murder defined him for the world -- or at least the sane and sensible fraction of the world --- just as Don Corleone in the Godfather ordered the decapitated horse's head to be placed in Jack Woltz' bedroom. Like the bloody horse head, Polonium poisoning signaled a public but deniable threat to Putin's enemies: Defy me, and I can use the rarest poison in the world to kill you anywhere I choose. And I will get away with it, because everybody else is cowed. Which is exactly what happened. Putin never paid a price, and in the manner of bullies everywhere, he was emboldened when the Brits failed to respond to Litvinenko's assassination in the middle of London. That is why Putin's invasion of the small, free, and democratic Republic of Georgia was predictable. Today the Russian threat to the Ukraine is just as obvious.
1
POPSKremlin Charges Two Russian-Americans With Industrial Espionage RIA Novosti reports that the FSB specifically accused the Zaslavskys of "illegally gathering secret commercial information for the benefit of several foreign oil and gas companies, in order to give them advantages over Russian competitors." The Russian authorities' attention to the Zaslavskys' ties to the British Council has further soured relations between Britain and Russia. The Guardian reports that in January, Russia closed the regional offices of the British Council in St. Petersburg and Yekaterinburg as part of the ongoing diplomatic conflict between the two nations over the murder of former KGB agent and British resident Alexander Litvinenko in 2006. But Thompson Financial reports that the Russian government said the Zaslavskys' arrests were "not connected to the present state of Russian-British relations."
1
POPSGeorgian Billionaire Found Dead In Surrey Feared Plots Russian Alexander Litvinenko also had links with the Georgian businessman. Sources in Tbilisi have told The Times that he stayed at Mr Patarkatshvili's residence in Georgia en route to Turkey when he fled Russia to seek asylum in London in 2000. Russian prosecutors claim that Mr Litvinenko also visited Mr Patarkatsishvili as well as Mr Berezovsky in London shortly before he was poisoned. They accuse Mr Berezovsky of involvement in the murder of the former Federal Security Service (FSB) agent as part of a plot to damage President Putin's international image.
3
Pops
Newest Clips
Latest Comments
Most Pops
Print
Save
Turn on live update