Dec 03 2006
Litvinenko Warned By US & UK About Berezovsky
Now I understand why authorities in the UK and US are so obsessed with the assassination theory behind Litvinenko’s death – they have a stake in that theory being proven correct:
Alexander Litvinenko was warned by British and American secret agents that his life was in danger because of his ties with exiled Russian oligarch Boris Berezovsky, The Mail on Sunday can reveal.
Litvinenko told Italian security adviser Mario Scaramella at their now-infamous lunch at a sushi restaurant that he had ‘interrupted’ his work with Berezovsky on ‘US and British advice’.
Scaramella then told another Russian intelligence specialist – who is under the protection of the French secret services – that Litvinenko had recently fallen out with Berezovsky. Evgeni Limarev said: ‘I had very strong information, confirmed by Mario, that Litvinenko had quarrelled with Berezovsky. I can’t say more than that.’
So what was this falling out? How could that be if Litvinenko was at Berezovsky’s offices recently? Was Litvinenko tired of his low level role compared to Lugovoi and others? Is it even plausible the US andUK would warn Litvinenko and he would not warn Berezovsky?
One thing is for sure, ifpeople in the US and UK believed Litvinenko was a target before his contamination they would have a tough time stepping back and seeing other alternative scenarios. But I still think Litvinenk was feeding Scaramella boatloads of BS on all sorts of topics. However, it does bring Berezovsky back to the center of this mess were I suspected it would lead.
Update: Here is the man, Yuri Shvetz, who was questioned here in the DC area regarding this case. His expertise is very telling. As are his ties to Berezovsky:
All lines seem to point to Berezovsky, and people willing to provide evidence to this case. A man in jail in Russia, numerous ex Russian spies, a PR mouthpiece….
“What is someone going to do, kill them? ” Probably –if they can provide useful information to the investigators.
What if everyone of these people except Zaparev and Bereszovsky didn’t know how lethal the shipment they were carrying was? If the Iranians were involved, maybe just Zaparev knew. Someone was extremely careless not just once but at least twice unless the stuff was brought to the UK on Oct. 25. But then, where was it stashed until Nov l? And who is the guy in MI6 custody?
I wonder if Litvinenko had some gum, candy or breath mints in his pocket and this stuff got contaminated with polonium. If it was in crystal form and powdery it could have seeped into the openings of these things. It might not have even been in the same pocket . It could have seeped through the weave of his suit to this stuff.
A new article with something for everyone:
http://www.cnn.com/2006/WORLD/europe/12/03/uk.spywrap.ap/index.html
Lugovoi isn’t contanimated? Shvetz told authorities who did it, from first hand info. International terrorism? Scaramella told he has 5x lethal dose.
Barbara earlier on another thread I suggested a loose pill or sweetner for his tea or something else sticky – glad I am not alone with these musings
“CP – do you think Boris is contaminated and we just haven’t heard anything? We know Goldfarb refuses to be tested.”
At this point I would have expected the lot of them to have had external contamination at one point or another. I would expect him to be at risk for internal contamination and would suggest he be tested for his own peace of mind. So far it appears that every single one of them has probably been contaminated to some extent though all might not have ingested it. Simply sitting in the same chair one of the others had used would be enough.
This time I think you’re on to something.
Wow, am I waaay behind on this story.
Good thing you guys keep me up to speed on this. I certainly wouldn’t know what was going on from watching CNN.
O.T. – Not sure if anyone is interested but a newly elected Democrat, who worked in the Pentagon, is now going on record as being certain that Saddam had a relationship with al Qaeda, details here…
http://regimeofterror.com/archives/2006/12/what_does_congressman_elect_ch/
AJ,
You might find this discussion at Hot Air interesting (your theories are being discussed):
Spymania: Suspicions swirl around … everyone
Here’s a better link or please “scroll up ↑” if you use the above link… I linked to a comment in the thread by mistake.
Scaramella: A riddle wrapped in a mystery The Scotsman
Here is a link to the story.
As someone who is of Sicilian decent, I can confirm the information from Nick Pisa below when he says that you can’t hide a Neapolitan accent. It is very distinct, even in those who have been here in America for more than 50 years still have the accent.
Yesterday the Italian newspaper La Repubblica claimed the academic was under investigation for smuggling weapons between the former Soviet Union and Italy. It detailed how police in his home town, Naples, had been looking into the consulting work Mr Scaramella had carried out with Mr Guzzanti while working on the Mitrokhin Commission.
The newspaper alleged that police became suspicious as Mr Scaramella was said to have “detailed information”, down to the route of the truck carrying the weapons.
It claimed police intercepted conversations with Mr Litvinenko discussing arms shipments from the former Soviet Union. They also intercepted conversations with another Russian secret service defector Euvgenij Limarev – the source of the e-mail hit-list shown to Mr Litvinenko.
Nick Pisa, the first British journalist to interview Mr Scaramella following the Litvinenko poisoning, said: “The one thing I could not shake from my mind was how he spoke English with a slight Russian accent – being of southern Italian background myself I can recognise a Neapolitan accent and Professor Scaramella had no trace of one when he spoke English.
“His mannerisms were not like those of a typical southern Italian – there was very little hand waving and excitable chatter.
“Two days later, he held his now infamous press conference in Rome where he shattered illusions of James Bond style espionage by revealing he had eaten at Pizza Hut before meeting Litvinenko. Again this to me seemed strange – a true Neapolitan would never dream of having pizza anywhere but Naples, let alone set foot in Pizza Hut.
SBD
If somebody was smuggling polonium out of Iran what route would one take – via Moscow?
a room in a London hotel, believed to be the Millennium. The high contamination count there led experts from Britain’s Atomic Weapons Establishment to suspect that polonium was stored in the room
http://www.thefirstpost.co.uk/index.php?menuID=2&subID=1182&p=2
not sure I have read this before. Of course Luguvoi didn’t stay there till November and it was already in London possibly by the 25th of Oct so where was it before that? The Park Lane Hotel? and where was it when Lugovoy went back to Moscow in the interim?
The thing that has bothered me is why did Scaramella want to meet with Litvinenko in person? Why not just send him a fax or e-mail? Why go to all the trouble of coming to London just for this meeting? And why, since they were meeting for lunch did he not eat?
And how did he get 5x the fatal dose if he ate nothing and only drank water? After all, this meeting seems to be the only time he could have been contaminated. Also why, since he testified against Litvinenko in the 2000 smuggling charge, were they friends? All he had to do was send him word that a mutual friend told him they were both on someone’s hit list and let Litvinenko do what he wanted about it.
I read in the Scotsman link what Nick Pisa said about Sicilian accents. I can verify this. I lived next door to a lady who had come over from Sicily as a bride about 50 years before. She married an Italian American. He spoke perfect English but I could barely understand her because her accent was so thick. She had 5 children and umpteen grandchildren here but she never lost her accent.
Lovely lady, but I really couldn’t talk to her much
My point is this? Who is Scaramella? And how did he get poisoned with so much polonium? The waitress said Litvinenko went to the rest room and left his food sitting on the table. Maybe Scaramella poisoned his food. But that doesn’t explain all the other contaminated people and sites unless Scaramella’s orders were to also eliminate Bereszovsky, Zaparev and Lugovoi and was poisoned him himself in the process of doing all this. Maybe Scaramella pulled a Litvinenko and switched sides by joining the mole he had been investigating in Italy. The solutions to this puzzle are limitless at this point. And with this crew I wouldn’t eliminate anybody involved.
Barbara,
If you think you are under threat by an intelligence agency able to tap phones and intercept email, the last thing you do is discuss your plans so the enemies can know what you are doing. Now with that said – I think Scaramella may be in this more than he seems, or he is just someone who naively trusted Litvinenko (many people did) and was caught up accidentally.
AJ
Scaramella had been in the espionage business for many years. I would think that he had learned long ago not to trust anyone involved and certainly not an ex KGB agent. I would think he knew he could be killed at any time given his vocation. Perhaps the people who ordered him to kill Litvinenko felt he was disposable also. However, I will concede , now that I think about it, Litvinenko’s phone and maybe fax was tapped. I am not sold on Scaramella being the culprit. I am just throwing out theories. They seem to be limitless. This thing just keeps getting bigger and bigger.
“If somebody was smuggling polonium out of Iran what route would one take – via Moscow?”
It would depend on who is doing the smuggling and what it is for. If the Revolutionary Guards were supplying polonium to Chechen rebels or other terrorists, it might not go through Russia directly. It might go through Iraq to London. Remember that Luguvoi and Litvinenko met on the 17th at a security company in London. That company does quite a bit of business in Iraq. The Revolutionary Guards have been dealing quite a bit in Iraq providing Shiite militias with weapons and training. It shouldn’t be hard to smuggle a little polonium across the border.
Luguvoi has accused Livinenko of contaminating him during that meeting on the 17th in order to explain how he was contaminated on the 25th, the date he occupied an airplane seat that was later found to be contaminated.
I don’t believe Scaramella met directly with Luguvoi, did he? Everyone that has been contaminated has met with Litvinenko at some point. I believe it is possible that Luguvoi was the “mule” that was transporting polonium. Since he never met directly with Scaramella that I am aware of, I doubt Luguvoi is the assassin.
Also note that Scaramella “feels fine”. That is the way polonium poisoning is supposed to work. The victim gets sick at some time after the actual poisoning. So much later, in fact, that memory fades and they can’t be quite sure when or where they got the poison. Litvinenko got such a massive dose that he got sick the same day. That narrows down the time of when he could have been exposed and who he had contact with considerably.
We either have a very sloppy and very stupid assassin, an accident, or an amateur (one of his business associates).
Mark78
Your link goes not an inch toward justifying Bush’s invasion of Iraq.
Cheney and others gave the impression, purposely, that Saddam had a hand in 9/11-which the US troops in Iraq told the Zogby Poll
interrogators was their chief reason for being there, to get even, that is.
Apart from this essential, it is not surprising if every entity of power
in the Middle East other than Israel has contacts involving a
broad “linkage” with each other. They have a common belief in
limiting US influence in the area,as long as it is pro-Israel, even
when they have equally common goals of keeping each other in
check.
All of which should point you to America’s hopelessly declining
posture in the region.
The world could be exploding around him and Ken would still be on his soapbox spouting his garbage about the Iraq war, the Jews and the horrible government the US has. Pitiful.