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THE Russian president, Vladimir Putin, has expressed his anger at Britain’s failure to gag Alexander Litvinenko in the final hours of his life, the cabinet has been told.Margaret Beckett, the foreign secretary, told ministers that the Russian government had “taken exception” to the poisoned former spy’s deathbed letter accusing the Putin regime of murdering him. This weekend a potential suspect — Andrei Lugovoi — admitted he had been contaminated with the radioactive poison polonium-210 but insisted: “I’ve been framed.” Beckett, who spoke to her Russian counterpart before Thursday’s cabinet meeting, said the Russians had “seemingly failed to understand” that Litvinenko...

Russian agents came close to carrying out the perfect assassination on British soil when they killed Alexander Litvinenko... Security sources have disclosed that the former Russian spy would have died within hours had the poisoned tea he was given been served hot. Litvinenko, a former KGB agent who had become a critic of the government of Russia's then president, Vladimir Putin... Security sources say that during the meeting Litvinenko took just a few sips of the tea but left the remainder of the cup because it was cold. "If Litvinenko had drunk all the tea he would have been dead...

If elected, Andrei Lugovoi would be granted immunity from prosecution A Russian businessman wanted in Britain on suspicion of murdering Alexander Litvinenko says he will stand for election to the Russian parliament. Andrei Lugovoi denies any involvement in former Russian agent Mr Litvinenko's death from poisoning in London in November 2006. He has said he will run for the Liberal Democratic Party (LDPR) of the Russian nationalist Vladimir Zhirinovsky. If elected in December, Mr Lugovoi would get immunity from prosecution. "I confirm LDPR leader Vladimir Zhirinovsky's announcement that I have agreed to join the party's electoral list," Mr Lugovoi told...

Prime suspect in Litvinenko case to run for Russian parliament Posted on : 2007-09-16 | Author : DPA News Category : Europe Moscow - Andrei Lugovi, the prime suspect in the murder case of Kremlin opponent Alexander Litvinenko, is to run for Russian parliament (Duma) as number 2 on the Liberal Democratic Party (LDPR) list, Duma Deputy Speaker Vladimir Zhirinovsky announced Sunday. According to the Interfax news agency, Lugovoi agreed to run in the election with the LDPR, led by the nationalist Zhirinovsky. Former Russian secret service agent Lugovoi is accused by Britain's Scotland Yard of administering a lethal dose...

MOSCOW (AP) — The sole suspect in the radiation poisoning death of a former KGB agent announced plans to run for parliament Sunday on the ticket of a pro-Kremlin ultranationalist party. Andrei Lugovoi, another former KGB officer who met with Alexander Litvinenko at a London hotel bar on Nov. 1 hours before Litvinenko fell ill, told state-run Russia Today television that he had no desire to go into politics but changed his mind because of British accusations. Now a Moscow businessman who runs a private security agency, Lugovoi said Sunday that he would be No. 2 on the list of...

MOSCOW (AFP) - Russia could prosecute businessman and former Soviet KGB agent Andrei Lugovoi in the Litvinenko affair if Britain provides "proof" of his guilt, Russia's foreign minister said Friday. If the British "have proof that has 100 percent convinced them of Lugovoi's guilt, we are ready to receive it and study it," Sergei Lavrov said, cited by Interfax news agency from Beijing. At the same time, he said Russia did not intend to exchange Lugovoi for Russian businessman and Kremlin critic Boris Berezovsky, who currently lives in London and is wanted in Russia on various charges of fraud. "For...

Andrei Lugovoi, the former KGB officer who is subject to a extradition request from the UK, strolled into his Moscow office flashing his broadest grin.As always, he was nattily dressed - this time in an open-necked Thomas Pink shirt. Extending a cuff-linked arm in greeting, he offered his guests a cup of tea and settled languorously into his leather swivel chair. For a man at the heart of the worst diplomatic crisis between Russia and Britain since the end of the Cold War, Mr Lugovoi seems to be insouciance personified. It was not always so. When The Daily Telegraph first...

The Polonium Diversion At least a dozen people have been contaminated by the rare radioactive isotope Polonium 210. The list includes Alexander Litvinenko, the ex-Lieutenant Colonel in the KGB who died from a dose of Polonium 210 in London on November 23rd; Andrei Lugovoi, a former colleague of Litvinenko in the KGB, who met with Litvinenko at the Pine bar of the Millennium Hotel in London the day he became ill, November 1st; Dmitry Lugovoi, Lugovoi’s business associate, who also attended that November 1st meetings; 7 employees of the Millennium Hotel; Mario Scaramella, an Italian security consultant, who dined with...

'Walking Dirty Bomb' Tells of London Meetings By Anna Sadovnikova, Hans Hoyng, Thomas Hüetlin and Uwe Klussmann A few days before he was put in quarantine in a Moscow hospital, Russian businessman Andrei Lugovoi, believed to be one of Scotland Yard's main suspects in the killing of Alexander Litvinenko, spoke to DER SPIEGEL about his meetings with the former spy. Russian businessman Andrei Lugovoi during an interview on Ekho Moskvy radio in Moscow, November 23. Andrei Lugovoi, 40, former KGB agent, currently a kind of mini magnate in the Russian soft drinks industry, is the man British investigators believe left...