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Russian suggests Litvinenko may have smuggled polonium
Dec 20, 2006, 17:17 GMT
Mainz, Germany - A Russian businessman who has been implicated in the mysterious London polonium poisoning case has told a German television channel that he thinks the dead man, Alexander Litvinenko, may have been a polonium smuggler.
ZDF public television in Mainz said Wednesday it had telephoned Dmitry Kovtun in Moscow. German police are investigating Kovtun for illicit radiation use after he spread traces of polonium during a visit to the German city of Hamburg in late October.
British police say Kovtun met on November 1 in London with former Russian secret agent Litvinenko, who fell ill and died three weeks later.
'I believe Litvinenko was unreliable. He was short of money. It's conceivable that he was smuggling polonium,' Kovtun said.
ZDF, which was to air an investigative programme about the case Wednesday evening, released an account of the interview in advance.
'I have never been involved with polonium,' Kovtun added. 'I know nothing about that, and nobody gave me any of it.'
Russian news reports say Kovtun has been under treatment in a specialized clinic for polonium poisoning.
Kovtun and a business partner Andrei Lugovoi say they met Litvinenko in mid-October in London.
© 2006 dpa - Deutsche Presse-AgenturCOMMENT
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InvestigandumDec 20th, 2006 - 22:48:31
I'm of the same opinion regarding Litvinenko, and I also think that among other unknown people, both Kovtun himself and Lugovoy are part of the botched polonium-smuggling operation. Much more disturbing however, is the possibility of frequent nuclear deals on an international level in which governments of democratic countries and dictatorships alike are involved in this dirty business with the employees of secret services such as MI5/MI6, FSB, ISI (Pakistan) and G.I.D. (Saudi-Arabia) carrying out their governments' orders.
The million dollar question is: Where might al-Qaeda figure into all of this?
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