Dec 11 2006
New Litvinenko Theory
Update: Terrible news out of Germany as it appears Kovtun’s ex-wife, her two kids and her current partner werer contamination, and possibly poisoned, by Polonium 210:
Four people in Germany may have ingested the radioactive substance that killed former Russian spy Alexander Litvinenko, German police said, as German investigators probed the activities of one of his business associates in Hamburg.
The ex-wife and two children of Dmitry Kovtun, who is being investigated for suspected handling of polonium 210, likely had contact with the substance while Kovtun was in Hamburg in late October, police said at a press conference broadcast on N24. A fourth person, Kovtun’s ex-wife’s partner, also tested positive.
German authorities discovered radioactive traces linked to Kovtun that he left while visiting the city days before his Nov. 1 meeting with Litvinenko, who died last month in London from radiation poisoning. Police spokesman Andreas Schoepflin said it was unclear whether Kovtun, who is also currently being treated for radiation poison in Moscow, knowingly handled the material.
The police said it wasn’t yet clear whether the four had merely been contaminated — which doesn’t necessarily represent a critical danger — or had ingested the substance.
There is nothing one can do if poisoned. Let’s all hope they are only contaminated. – end update
I am looking at the fact that Lugovoi and Kovtun may have been contaminated in Moscow from material they handled and thinking I have had this slightly backwards. If Berezovsky is smuggling Polonium 210 into Russia for his Chechen brothers to help him overthrow Russia by force (something he openly claimed was his intention earlier this year) then maybe Lugovoi and Kovtun did not know what they were transporting for Berezovsky and Litvinenko. Maybe the smuggling is coming into the UK via other security company transporters, and the material is being assembled in hotels Lugovoi stays at so he and his Russian buddies can transport the material into Moscow. As I said many times, the transporters were probably never told what they were handling to keep a lid on the purpose for the smuggling. I think this is the case because both Lugovoi and Kovtun have exposed their families and are just as shocked as anyone else about what is going on. If they knew what they were in contact with I am sure they would have taken steps to avoid leaving a trail and risking their children.
If this is true, then Lugovoi and Kovtun would probably be testifying against Litvinenko and Berezovsky – which appears to be a possibility:
Lugovoi told ITAR-Tass that the questioning lasted three hours.
“I gave testimony exclusively as a witness. I was officially informed of that before the interrogation,” ITAR-Tass quoted him as saying after questioning.
Neither the Russian Prosecutor General’s Office, which is managing the British investigators’ program in Moscow, nor the British Embassy would reveal any details of the investigation, the AP says.
What is worrisome is whether the Polonium 210 took two paths – on to Moscow and one someplace else still in the UK. All speculation, but the contamination trail makes sense since Kovtun seems to have been exposed in Moscow but did not have the material with him when he went through Hamburg to London. All wild speculation of course – but it does fit all the facts as we know them.
All the more reason for Lugovoi to bump off Litvinenko if he discovered he was contaminated and possibly contaminated his family. They might have been desparate for a way to get everyone to medical treatment.
CP, if they were that desperate, it does not make sense that they would waste time with revenge on Litvinenko at that time.
If Litvinenko brought the Po on his first trip, then why would Litvinenko go back there? You mean that they found out that the container was compromised, got pissed off and lured him back to the hotel? If so, they would have to know what it was to get that angry.
The contamination trail is as the Germans have said somewhat random – Kovtow was contaminated already in Hamburg and left traces but there was none on the plane to London- that could mean that he had the PO in a sealed container that did not leak on this particular trip. Or it could mean that Kovtow and Lugovoi separated the stuff in Moscow in Kovtow’s Moscow office which he has said is also contaminated on or about Oct. 28 and Lugovoi brought it to London Oct 31 and Kovtov just went back to Hamburg for a few days on his way back to London Nov 1.
What was Kovtov doing between the Oct. 16 meeting and the Nov. 1 meeting – he was presumably not in London during that time so where was he and what was he doing? This suggests that either Kovtov was contaminated in London or later in Moscow or both
Yes, I find it highly unlikely that Lugovoy and Kovtun would deliberately contaminate their own families. If that’s the case, we know that they did not know what/ or the properties of whatever they (a) were carrying or (b) what had somehow been planted on them.
Supposedly, Kovtun and Lugovoi are partners in a multi-million beverage distribution enterprise in Russia. By that , one could presume they share offices in Moscow, but who knows.
What bothers me about this is, why bring the stuff through the UK, of all places? Why not bring it into Russia more directly, or through a country where you could easily use ground transportation?
Gotta Know,
There could be lots of reasons. Some was going to the UK the rest to Russia. This path looked like the one least likely to raise suspicions. This is where they had people they could trust. And I am not saying it happened this way. Just speculating.
The BBC has said that Lugovoi will give a press conference after a second round of questioning – it didnt say when that would be.
I’m not sure how serious the contamination/”poisoning” in Germany really is, I”d bet the people in the Millennium bar are worse off and they really aren’t in any danger – unless Kovtun has much worse contanination than has been reported so far. Right now I’d say this is media hysteria/vagueness.
For me it’s difficult to imagine Lugovoi and Kuvtun assembling a dirty bomb that would be used on Russians, though I have been leaning toward some sort of smuggling after learning that many of these people were closer to BorisB than Putin. It is a fascinating mystery.
Lugovoys big business was security..exactly what Litvinenko did when he was with the KGB/FSB. Is it possible that one of his clients dealt with PO and tracked it into Lugovoy’s office where he and Kovtun were repeatedly contaminated with it? Is it possible that Lugovoy was unwittingly contaminated at one of his client’s operations and unwittingly kept tracking it back to his office?Is it possible that Kovtun who by all accounts is more contaminated because he somehow ingested it?
Is it possible that that client murdered Litvinenko?
Is it possible that Lugovoy or Kovtun accidently contaminated a cup used by Litvinenko , a cup whose glaze had been compromised by a crack, a crazing or eroded glaze?
This kind of contamination trail is what makes it less likely in my opinion that it was a state hit. It is apparently extremely messy. But something to keep in mind is that our ability to detect this stuff is very sensative and we can locate quantities that would pose no poisoning threat. Remember that we detected polonium in air samples from North Korea which was an indication that they were possibly building a nuclear bomb so our ability to detect only a quantity of atoms of the stuff has been quite advanced by the nuclear monitoring requirements over the past several decades. In other words, it is something we actively look for in nuclear weapons development because this is one of the few triggers you can make without access to a heavy water reactor.
I also find this interesting in that Lugovoi keeps bringing this up (or at least the media do):
“Mr Lugovoi has suggested that he and Mr Kovtun were contaminated with radiation when they met Mr Litvinenko on an earlier trip to London in October.”
Lugovoi is trying desparately to tell them something without coming completely clean and telling 100% of what he knows, or he is trying to keep the finger pointed at Litvinenko to cover his own smuggling operations.
Maybe. Maybe he’s hinting that someone was trying to kill Litvinenko earlier–a theory the Times reported early on.
The problem I have is that no matter how far back they go, they keep finding contamination surrounding Lugovoi. I only know about the 16th because I read contamination had been found in a place he visited. Trouble is that if he visited the same places on previous trips, there is no way to tell if he was contaminated then too. You would have to go back and find other hotels/rooms and ask him details of who he met with and when. Some of those additional hotel rooms could be from previous trips.
Bringing this Times graphic back to remind us all of Lugovoi’s polonium trail:
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/TGD/picture/0,,372249,00.jpg
Details on Kovtun’s whereabouts, etc., around Oct. 31 are off in the above Times graphic.
He was apparently in Moscow until flew to Hamburg, then flew to London on Nov. 1
Mariposa, Am I wrong? As I read that map, the first sign of radiation on Lugovoy is on Oct 25.
It has been stated by several sources that places he visited on the trip of the 16th/17th have shown to be contaminated.