Chapter 10: Russian State responsibility – events since Alexander Litvinenko's death
Chapter 10: Russian State responsibility – events since Alexander Litvinenko's death
¶9.164 It is apparent that Mr Litvinenko was not mourned long in Russia, at least not by
the government. Leading politicians made speeches attacking Mr Litvinenko and even implying that he had deserved his fate (some of which I have referred to in chapter 2 of Part 4 above). It has been suggested that British and German police investigating Mr Litvinenko's death received less than full cooperation from their Russian counterparts. The Russian government refused a request made by the British government to extradite Mr Lugovoy and Mr Kovtun to face criminal charges. Mr Lugovoy has been lionised in Russia. He has become a member of the Duma, and indeed was awarded an honour by President Putin during the course of the Inquiry's hearings.
¶9.165 The question for present purposes is whether any of these matters amount to evidence that the Russian government was actually involved in Mr Litvinenko's murder.
¶Engagement with the criminal investigations Russian aircraft not made available for testing 9.166 I have referred during the course of the narrative in Part 6 above to two occasions on
which British and German police investigators respectively were not able to inspect Russian passenger aircraft that were of interest to their enquiries.
¶9.167 One of those planes was that on which Mr Lugovoy and Mr Kovtun had flown from
Moscow to London on 16 October 2006 – Transaero EI-DDK (see above at paragraph 6.69). The other was the Aeroflot aircraft on which Mr Kovtun flew from Moscow to Hamburg on 28 October 2006 (see paragraph 6.199 above).
¶9.168 I do not think that it would be safe to draw any inferences about responsibility for
Mr Litvinenko's death from these two incidents. There is insufficient evidence to be clear as to exactly what happened. Moreover, the two aircraft were operated by two independent companies. Even on the assumption that the aircraft were deliberately replaced on the schedules to avoid them being tested, there is no evidence on which I can safely determine whether this was done at the instigation of the airlines to avoid delay and disruption, or at the instigation of the Russian government, perhaps for more sinister reasons.
¶Metropolitan Police Service visit to Moscow, December 2006 9.169 In December 2006, officers from the Metropolitan Police team investigating
236Mr Litvinenko's death made a formal visit to Moscow to interview witnesses. I heard evidence from two officers who went on the trip to Moscow – Mr Tarpey70 and Mr Slater.71
¶The Litvinenko Inquiry
¶9.170 It was a theme of the evidence of both these men that the trip to Moscow had not run
smoothly. They described a large number of incidents that occurred during their stay in Moscow that, to them at least, seemed to demonstrate obstructiveness on the part of their Russian colleagues. For example, the British investigators were told that only one British investigator (rather than two) could sit in on interviews, that lists of questions had to be provided in advance, and that they could not make their own separate recordings of interviews. There was even an occasion on which Russian officials who were driving to an interview location in the knowledge that British investigators were following in a car behind drove fast and erratically in an apparent attempt to lose the British team.
¶9.171 Further, particular difficulties were experienced in relation to the interviews of the two
key witnesses, Mr Kovtun and Mr Lugovoy. Interviews were cancelled at short notice and then hastily rearranged, and when they did take place were rushed with limited opportunity for the single British investigator present to ask questions. The British team were told that the two men were being treated for radiation sickness, but when they were interviewed they did not appear to be ill. Finally, when the interview tapes that had been handed to the British investigators in Moscow were examined back in London, it was discovered that there was no tape of Mr Lugovoy's interview. The Russian authorities had not provided any advance warning that there would be no tape of this interview.72
¶9.172 In his closing statement, Mr Horwell QC, who appeared on behalf of the Metropolitan
¶Police Service, made the following submissions about these events:73
¶"Why be obstructive if there was nothing to hide?"
"The lack of full cooperation in Moscow with the interviews of Lugovoy and Kovtun: stupid, petty obstructions placed in the way of the police officers who went to interview them. The failure of the Russians to supply the tape of Lugovoy's interview perhaps says it all. The motivation obvious. The Russians wanted control of those interviews, a control which was resurrected but a few days ago. Hardly a reaction indicative of an interest in truth and justice."
¶9.173 My observations on these events, and the inferences that may be drawn from them, are as follows.
¶9.174 First, it is quite apparent that the British investigators did not receive the level of
cooperation in Moscow that they had hoped for, and that in consequence the enquiries that they conducted during their stay there were not as full as they might otherwise have been. It was clear to me that this was a matter that still rankles with those involved, even now, several years after the event.
¶9.175 Second, there is no direct evidence as to the explanation for the conduct of the Russian
237officials. I had hoped that one of the Russian investigators might have given evidence to the Inquiry, in which case an explanation could have been sought, but this has not transpired. I am well aware, however, that the procedures governing international cooperation between police forces are complex and quite capable of giving rise to misunderstandings. There are a number of possible explanations – good, bad and indifferent – for what the British police saw as the obstructiveness of the Russian officials. In the absence of any explanation from the Russian side, I do not think it
¶Part 9 | Chapters 1 to 12 | Who directed the killing?
is possible to draw any firm conclusions. It would certainly not be appropriate, in my view, to conclude that the Russian authorities were deliberately attempting to undermine the British investigation.
¶9.176 Third, even if I did make such a finding, it would still be another considerable step to
find that the Russian authorities had acted in this way in order to conceal their own involvement in Mr Litvinenko's death. Standing alone, this evidence cannot justify this conclusion.
¶Refusal of extradition requests 9.177 Russia has refused requests made by the British authorities to extradite Mr Lugovoy
and Mr Kovtun to face criminal charges in the UK. No inferences can be drawn from this. Article 61(1) of the Russian constitution provides that, "A citizen of the Russian Federation may not be deported from Russia or extradited to another State."
¶9.178 Moreover, as Professor Service pointedly observed:74
"It was no surprise that the Russian authorities refused to comply with the British request for their extradition to stand trial since the UK authorities had turned down every Russian request to extradite Berezovski and other wanted Russian citizens to Moscow."
¶The careers of Mr Kovtun and Mr Lugovoy since 2006 9.179 Professor Service had this to say about the careers in Russia of Mr Lugovoy and
¶Mr Kovtun in the years following Mr Litvinenko's death:75
"A wall of protection was built around Lugovoi and Kovtun. Although Kovtun did not exactly avoid public attention, he gave only a few interviews to the print and broadcast media. His partner Lugovoi by contrast has paraded himself at every opportunity. He was welcomed into the Liberal Democratic Party and became one of its successful candidates in the Duma elections of 2007; he appeared on TV chat shows and has recently been appointed an adviser to a television series about spies.
The careers of Lugovoi and Kovtun since 2006 seem to me unimaginable without high-level political approval. The fact that Lugovoi has joined Zhironovski's Liberal Democratic Party, moreover, is not a sign of Lugovoi's alienation from the central state authorities. It is a party that since the early 1990s has acted as a pseudo- critical part of the tolerated opposition to whoever is President at the time. Lugovoi is a prominent, officially-respected public figure."
¶9.180 Professor Service expanded on these points in the course of his oral evidence.76 He
238emphasised that Mr Lugovoy's membership of the Liberal Democratic Party did not mean that he was a political opponent of President Putin in any substantive sense. Professor Service also drew attention to the importance that President Putin placed on television as a source of public information and the control that he therefore sought to exercise over it. Professor Service observed that, in those circumstances, the fact
¶The Litvinenko Inquiry
that President Putin had allowed Mr Lugovoy, "a prominent public role on Russian TV" was a telling indication that he "has had favour shown to him by the President".
¶9.181 In fact, during the course of the Inquiry's open hearings an event took place in Russia
that provided unambiguous evidence of the esteem in which President Putin holds Mr Lugovoy. In March 2015, President Putin awarded a state honour to Mr Lugovoy. A Reuters report carrying the headline "Russia's Putin honours suspect in Litvinenko poisoning" stated as follows:77
"Russian President Vladimir Putin awarded a state honour to a man suspected by Britain of using radioactive polonium to poison Kremlin critic Alexander Litvinenko in London nearly a decade ago. The medal 'for services to the fatherland', second degree, was given to Andrei Lugovoy for his contribution to developing Russia's Parliament, according to a citation posted on the official state bulletin."
¶9.182 Mr Emmerson QC submitted that the fact that the award to Mr Lugovoy had been made:78
"... on Day 22 of this Inquiry, after a substantial amount of evidence has been called establishing Mr Lugovoy's involvement in the murder of Mr Litvinenko, is clearly both a provocation by President Putin and the clearest possible message that he identifies himself with Mr Lugovoy."
¶9.183 I have already expressed my conclusion that Mr Lugovoy, with Mr Kovtun, poisoned
Mr Litvinenko. Whether President Putin knew about this at the time is a matter to which I shall come. However, I do accept that Mr Lugovoy's award, given in particular its timing and public nature, can only be interpreted as a deliberate sign of public support made to him by President Putin.
¶9.184 Where does this analysis lead? There is clear evidence, as I have said, that the
Russian State in general, and President Putin in particular, has supported Mr Lugovoy in the years since 2006. There is less evidence relating to Mr Kovtun, but it would certainly appear to be the case that he has suffered no ill consequences as a result of the allegations made against him in this country in connection with Mr Litvinenko's death.
¶9.185 It can be inferred from these facts that the Russian State approves of Mr Litvinenko's killing, or at least that it wishes to signal approval for it.
¶9.186 It would be a further step, however, to conclude that the conduct of the Russian State
239towards Mr Lugovoy and Mr Kovtun since Mr Litvinenko's death demonstrates that it was actually responsible in some way for his death. In my judgement, that would be a step too far. Taken on its own, this evidence does not support that conclusion.
¶Part 9 | Chapters 1 to 12 | Who directed the killing?