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https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alexander_Litvinenko
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alexander_Litvinenko
Career in Russian security services
In 1991, Litvinenko was promoted to the Central Staff of the Federal Counterintelligence Service, specialising in counter-terrorist activities and infiltration of organised crime. He was awarded the title of "MUR veteran" for operations conducted with the Moscow criminal investigation department, the MUR.[13] Litvinenko also saw active military service in many of the so-called "hot spots" of the former USSR and Russia.[14] During the First Chechen War Litvinenko planted several FSB agents in Chechnya. Although he was often named "Russian spy" by western press for propaganda reasons, throughout his career he was not an 'intelligence agent' and did not deal with secrets beyond information on operations against organised criminal groups.[10][15][16][17]
Litvinenko met Boris Berezovsky in 1994 when he took part in investigations into an assassination attempt on the oligarch. He later began to moonlight for Berezovsky and was responsible for the oligarch's security.[3][10] Litvinenko's employment under Berezovsky and other security services personnel was illegal, but the state somewhat tolerated it in order to retain staff who were at the time underpaid.[3][10] Thus, Litvinenko's employment for the controversial businessman and others was not investigated. Often such inquiries in Russia were selective and targeted only at those who had stepped out of line.[10]
In 1997, Litvinenko was promoted to the FSB Directorate of Analysis and Suppression of Criminal Groups, with the title of senior operational officer and deputy head of the Seventh Section.[18] According to Dimitri Simes, the Directorate was viewed as much as a part of organised crime as it was of law enforcement.[19]
Claims against FSB leadership
According to Litvinenko's widow Marina, while her husband was employed in the FSB he discovered numerous links among members of the top brass of Russian law enforcement agencies and Russian mafia groups, such as the Solntsevo gang. Berezovsky arranged a meeting for him with FSB Director Mikhail Barsukov and Deputy Director of Internal affairs Ovchinnikov to discuss the alleged corruption problems, with no result. This led him to the conclusion that the entire system was corrupt.[20]
In December 1997 Litvinenko claimed he received an order to kill Berezovsky. He did not inform his part-time employer until 20 March 1998.[10][21] According to his widow, on 25 July 1998, the day on which Vladimir Putin replaced Nikolay Kovalyov as the Director of the Federal Security Service, Berezovsky introduced Litvinenko to Putin. Berezovsky claimed that he had helped Putin to take the Director's position.[22] According to his widow, Litvinenko reported to Putin on corruption in the FSB, but Putin was unimpressed.[22] According to Litvinenko, Putin was involved with a corrupt military general in the Russian army when Putin was a Deputy for Economic Affairs to the Mayor of St. Petersburg. Litvenenko was doing an investigation into the general and Uzbek drug barons and believed that Putin tried to stall the investigation in order to save his reputation.[23]
On 13 November 1998, Berezovsky wrote an open letter to Putin in Kommersant. He accused heads of the Directorate of Analysis and Suppression of Criminal Groups Major-General Yevgeny Khokholkov, N. Stepanov, A. Kamyshnikov, N. Yenin of ordering his assassination.[24]
Four days later Litvinenko and four other officers appeared together in a press conference at the Russian news agency Interfax. All officers worked for both FSB in the Directorate of Analysis and Suppression of Criminal Groups and for Boris Berezovsky.[10] They repeated the allegation made by Berezovsky.[10][21] The officers also claimed they were ordered to kill Mikhail Trepashkin who was also present at the press conference, and to kidnap a brother of the businessman Umar Dzhabrailov.[21]
In 2007, Sergey Dorenko provided The Associated Press and The Wall Street Journal with a complete copy of an April 1998 interview he conducted for ORT television station with Litvinenko and his fellow employees. The interview, of which only excerpts were shown in 1998, shows the FSB officers, who were disguised in masks or dark glasses, claim that their bosses had ordered them to kill, kidnap or frame prominent Russian politicians and businesspeople.
Jim Heintz of the Associated Press opined that although Berezovsky does not appear in the interview, he has an omnipresence in it, given that the officers worked for him, and the interview was taped by Dorenko, a Russian journalist who was an employee of ORT owned in part by Berezovsky.[25]
Dismissal from the FSB
After holding the press conference, Litvinenko was dismissed from the FSB.[26] Later, in an interview with Yelena Tregubova, Putin said that he personally ordered the dismissal of Litvinenko, stating, "I fired Litvinenko and disbanded his unit ...because FSB officers should not stage press conferences. This is not their job. And they should not make internal scandals public."[27] Litvinenko also believed that Putin was behind his arrest. He said, "Putin had the power to decide whether to pass my file to the prosecutors or not. He always hated me. And there was a bonus for him: by throwing me to the wolves he distanced himself from Boris [Berezovsky] in the eyes of FSB's generals."[28]
Flight from Russia and asylum in the United Kingdom
This section requires expansion. (March 2009)
In October 2000, in violation of an order not to leave Moscow, Litvinenko and his family traveled to Turkey, possibly via the Ukraine.[29] While in Turkey, Litvinenko applied for asylum at the United States Embassy in Ankara, but his application was denied.[29] Henry Plater-Zyberk opined that the denial may have been based on possible American opinions that Litvinenko's knowledge was of little benefit and that he might create problems.[10] With the help of Alexander Goldfarb, Litvinenko bought air tickets for the Istanbul-London-Moscow flight,[30] and asked for political asylum at Heathrow Airport during the transit stop on 1 November 2000.[31] Political asylum was granted on 14 May 2001,[32] not because of his knowledge on intelligence matters, but rather on humanitarian grounds.[10] While in London he became a journalist for the separatist Chechenpress and a controversial author. He also joined Berezovsky in campaigning against Putin's government.[33][34] In October 2006 he became a naturalised British citizen with residence in Whitehaven.[35]
Cooperation with MI6
On 27 October 2007, the Daily Mail, citing "diplomatic and intelligence sources," stated that Mr Litvinenko was paid about £2,000 per month by MI6 at the time of his murder. John Scarlett, the head of MI6 (who was once based in Moscow), was allegedly personally involved in recruiting him.[16] The Independent stated that whilst cooperation of Litvinenko with MI6 will likely never be confirmed, an MI6 retainer for Litvinenko suggests systematic cooperation, because MI6 usually makes irregular payments to exiles in exchange for information.[36]
Litvinenko's widow Marina Litvinenko has admitted that her husband co-operated with the British MI6 and MI5, working as a consultant and helping the agencies to combat Russian organized crime in Europe.[37][38]
In February 2012, Litvinenko's father Valter apologized for what he called his personal "slander campaign" against the Russian government. Before the confession by Marina Litvinenko, he had publicly blamed the Russian security services for his son's death. In an interview Valter Litvinenko said that if he had known at the time that his son was a British intelligence agent, he would not have made such accusations.[39]
Alleged threats against Litvinenko
Former FSB officer Mikhail Trepashkin stated that in 2002 he had warned Litvinenko that an FSB unit was assigned to assassinate him.[40] In spite of this, Litvinenko often travelled overseas with no security arrangements, and freely mingled with the Russian community in the United Kingdom, and often received journalists at his home.[10][41] In January 2007, Polish newspaper Dziennik revealed that a target with a photo of Litvinenko on it was used for shooting practice by the Vityaz Training Centre in Balashikha in October 2002.[42] The centre, run by Sergey Lyusyuk, is not affiliated with the government, and trains bodyguards, debt collectors and private security forces,[43] although in November 2006 the centre was used by the Vityaz for a qualification examination due to their own centre being under renovation.[43] The targets, which Lyusyuk says were bought in the Olympic Market, were also photographed when the chairman of the Federation Council of Russia Sergei Mironov visited the centre and met Lyusyuk on 7 November 2006.[42][43] When asked why the photographs of Mironov's visit were removed from the centre's website Lyusyuk stated, "(T)hose Poles are up to something" and added that Mironov didn't see the targets and knew nothing about them.[43]
Alleged blackmail activities
According to Julia Svetlichnaya, a Russian doctoral candidate at the University of Westminster's Center for the Study of Democracy, Litvinenko told her that he was planning to blackmail or sell sensitive information on a wide range of people, including oligarchs, allegedly corrupt official and figures within the Kremlin hierarchy, in which he would extort £10,000 per instance to have him stop publication of alleged documents. Svetlichnaya noted that Litvinenko didn't have a steady income and was certain he could obtain the necessary files for this purpose.[44] According to The Observer, Litvinenko's alleged threats and access to FSB materials might have turned him into an enemy of big business and the Kremlin.[44]
Conviction in Russia
In 2002 Litvinenko was convicted in absentia in Russia and given a three and a half year jail sentence for charges of corruption.[45][46]