Spy's Poisoning May Have Been Earlier
Witness Says Former Russian Spy Alexander Litvinenko Was Poisoned Earlier Than Is Believed
Maria Danilova
MOSCOW Dec 13, 2006 (AP)— A key witness in the radiation death of former Russian intelligence officer Alexander Litvinenko claimed the poisoning took place earlier than is generally believed, according to a newspaper interview published Wednesday.
Andrei Lugovoi, also a former Russian intelligence agent, met with Litvinenko to discuss business at London's Millennium Mayfair Hotel on Nov. 1, a few hours before Litvinenko fell ill.
But Lugovoi said in an interview with the Moskovsky Komsomolets newspaper that he thinks Litvinenko may have been poisoned two weeks earlier, on the day he and Lugovoi met another business associate, Dmitry Kovtun. ...
Spymania: Suspects say poisoning occurred two weeks earlier than thought
Allahpundit
On the last episode of Spymania, I disputed the Times’s assertion that no polonium was present in London before November 1, the day Litvinenko was allegedly poisoned. According to the Times of London, the substance has since been detected in the office of Risc Management, a security firm visited by Litvinenko and the two Russian businessmen, Lugovoy and Kovtun, on or about October 17th.
Suddenly, Lugovoy and Kovtun are making a big deal about it:
Lugovoi told the tabloid newspaper [Moskovsky Komsomolets] that he, Kovtun and Litvinenko met in the office of a security company in London Oct. 16. He suggested that they all could have been contaminated during Lugovoi and Kovtun’s mid-October visit to London…
Presumably the cops told them they found polonium at Risc Management and that’s how they “know” the poisoning happened around that time. Kovtun was apparently radioactive by the time he reached Hamburg on October 28th, three days before Litvinenko supposedly got dosed, so it’s probably true that he, at least, ingested the stuff before November 1st. But did Litvinenko? Sources told the Guardian that he took in enough of it to kill him “100 times over.” If the poisoning took place in mid-October, why didn’t symptoms manifest themselves until two weeks later?
It could be that they’re trying to introduce an alibi here, but if they are, I can’t piece it together. The fact that Litvinenko might have been poisoned much early accomplishes what for them? They were the ones meeting with him in mid-October so they’re still the prime suspects. Maybe they’re suggesting that Risc Management is the source of the polonium and that all three of them were incidentally poisoned while on the premises. If so, British cops are playing it close to the vest: the only mention of Risc that I’ve come across was in the ToL article I mentioned. It’s not alleged to be a “hot spot” showing significant radioactivity; that distinction belongs to the men’s room of the hotel bar where Lugovoy and Kovtun met Litvinenko on November 1st.
We could go full-bore cloak and dagger here and ...
Some Litvinenko Thoughts
A J Strata
The news on Litvinenko’s death and the Polonium-210 trail has succumbed to the moder Ripper news, so obviously something very quiet is being done behind the scenes or the trail is growing cold. I think it is the former because this quick response by the Germans in response to some possible evidence that Kovtun made a phone call from Berlin during his period in Germany between Moscow and his trip to meet Lugovoi and Litvinenko in London.
I meant to note I find the constantly shifting stories by Lugovoi and Kovtun to be a clear sign they new full well they have been in contact with radiactive material. The tanning salon excuse is just pathetic. I also find their pointing to Oct 16th as possible contamination point telling as well. They knew that their illnesses were due to Polonium 210, but they only realized their problem after Litvinenko fell ill and died. Up until they could not hide the truth anymore (i.e., they needed medical attention) they tried to divert suspicion using one lame excuse after another. But they knew it was Polonium 210. ...
