Chapter 7: Events in Hamburg 28 October – 1 November
Chapter 7: Events in Hamburg 28 October – 1 November
¶6.190 Before turning to the group trip to London that commenced on 31 October, I propose
briefly to consider the evidence relating to Mr Kovtun's stay in Hamburg that immediately preceded it.
¶6.191 As DI Mascall explained in the course of his oral testimony to the Inquiry,173 the
evidence relating to this part of the narrative consists largely of the fruits of an investigation conducted by the German authorities in the aftermath of Mr Litvinenko's death. That investigation was commenced in late 2006 after the Metropolitan Police Service alerted their German colleagues to the details that they had uncovered as to Mr Kovtun's visit to Hamburg. The German police subsequently shared the evidence that they had obtained with the British police.
¶6.192 One piece of the evidence that emerged from the German investigation is potentially
of considerable significance. It concerns a conversation that one of the German witnesses, known to us as witness D3, says that he had with Mr Kovtun on the evening of 30 October 2006. As we shall see, the German and British investigating teams reached different conclusions as to the reliability of this evidence. The German police thought that D3 was lying. The British police thought that he might well be telling the truth. As DI Mascall stated, one explanation for this difference of views lay in the fact that the German police only had access to the relatively limited evidence that they themselves had obtained, whereas the British police could place D3's account in the context of all the other information that they had gathered in the course of their investigation.174
¶6.193 For the purposes of this Inquiry, the question of the weight to be placed on D3's evidence is of course a matter for me.
¶Outline of events 6.194 The core events of this episode emerged clearly from the evidence and are, I think, uncontroversial. They may be summarised as follows:
a. On the morning of Saturday 28 October – the same morning that Mr Lugovoy was returning to Moscow from London – Mr Kovtun took an Aeroflot flight from Moscow to Hamburg175
149b. Mr Kovtun was collected from Hamburg airport by his ex-wife Marina Wall, her partner Radoslaw Pietras and her children. He then returned with them to their flat and stayed there that night176
¶Part 6 | Chapters 1 to 8 | The polonium trail – events in October and November 2006
c. The next day, Sunday 29 October, Mr Kovtun made an internet booking for an early morning flight from Hamburg to London on Wednesday 1 November. He paid for the flight using Mr Pietras' credit card177
d. Later the same day (29 October) Mr Kovtun's ex-mother in law, Dr Elenora Wall, collected him and drove him to her house, where he stayed the night178
e. On Monday 30 October, Mr Kovtun and Marina Wall attended an appointment at the Hamburg Aliens' Registration Office. The purpose of the appointment was to have Mr Kovtun's German residency permit inserted into his new (Russian) passport. Marina Wall had pre-arranged the appointment for Mr Kovtun; Mr Kovtun had asked her to make the appointment in a telephone conversation at the end of August 2006179
f. On the same day (30 October), Mr Kovtun telephoned his friend D3 and arranged to meet him that evening at the Tarantella restaurant. Mr Kovtun and D3 spent the evening together and Mr Kovtun stayed that night at D3's flat180
g. On the following day, Tuesday 31 October, Mr Kovtun returned to Marina Wall's flat, where he spent the night181
h. Early on the morning of the following day (Wednesday 1 November), Mr Kovtun flew to London182
following Mr Litvinenko's death. Secondary contamination was discovered in many of the places that Mr Kovtun had visited during his brief stay.
¶6.196 Secondary contamination was found in Marina Wall's flat, where Mr Kovtun had spent
his first and last night in Hamburg, and also in the BMW car in which she had picked him up from the airport.183
¶6.197 Secondary contamination was also found in Elenora Wall's house.184 No contamination
was found at the Aliens' Registration Office, although a slightly raised reading was taken under the passport photograph in Mr Kovtun's passport.185
¶6.198 Secondary contamination was also found on the bed in D3's flat, where Mr Kovtun had spent the night of Monday 30 October.186
150¶The Litvinenko Inquiry
to London. The Germanwings aircraft was tested but no radiation was detected.187 The Aeroflot aircraft was never tested. DI Mascall stated that the German authorities had expected the aircraft to arrive from Russia on a certain date to be tested, but a different plane arrived in its place.188
¶The German witnesses 6.200 Before going further, there are two observations that I should make about the procedural position of the German witnesses.
¶6.201 First, it will be seen that a number of the German witnesses are referred to by way
of pseudonyms – D3, D6, D7, etc. The reason for this is that I have made orders granting these individuals anonymity for the purposes of these proceedings. The details of these orders and the grounds for making them are discussed in more detail at paragraphs 79-81 of Appendix 1. For the avoidance of doubt, and as with all such orders, the names of these individuals are of course known to me and to my team.
¶6.202 Second, all bar one of the German witnesses did not give oral evidence to the Inquiry.
Those who did not were D3, D7, Inna Hohne, Marina Wall and Elenora Wall. I had very much hoped that these witnesses would give oral evidence. They were contacted in advance and arrangements were made for evidence to be given using video link facilities in Hamburg. These facilities were used successfully for D6, who did give evidence. As DI Mascall explained, D7 did not give oral evidence because he was on holiday at the relevant time. As to the others, requests that they give oral evidence were sent to them and it is known that these requests were safely delivered. However, no responses to the requests were received. It is to be inferred that these individuals have declined to give oral evidence.189
¶6.203 In these circumstances, the evidence of these individuals was adduced by reading into the record sections of the transcripts of their interviews with the German investigators.
¶6.204 I should make it clear that, since these individuals are outside the jurisdiction, I have
no power to compel them to give oral evidence. As to the weight that I should attach to the transcripts of their interviews, it is true that it has not been possible for their evidence to be tested or challenged. I have also not had the opportunity of observing their demeanour in answering questions. Those are considerations that must be borne in mind in considering their evidence. They apply in particular to D3, whose evidence is the most controversial of the group. Aside from these practical considerations, I do not consider that the accounts given by any of these witnesses are rendered less reliable simply as a result of their refusal (as I interpret it) to give oral evidence. That was a decision that they were entitled to take, and they may each have had good reasons for taking it.
¶D3's account 6.205 It seems to me to be clear from the evidence that the initial purpose of Mr Kovtun's
151trip to Hamburg was to attend the appointment at the Aliens' Registration Office that Marina Wall had booked for him several weeks before. It is also apparent, and unsurprising, that Mr Kovtun took the opportunity of his brief stay in Hamburg to catch
¶Part 6 | Chapters 1 to 8 | The polonium trail – events in October and November 2006
up with old friends and former family members. The secondary contamination that was discovered in the places Mr Kovtun visited, whilst important, is no more than consistent with the contamination discovered in London that is linked to Mr Kovtun's movements both before and after his time in Hamburg.
¶6.206 The single piece of evidence about Mr Kovtun's time in Hamburg that stands out from
the rest is the account given by D3 of a brief conversation that he had with Mr Kovtun during the evening of Monday 30 October 2006.
¶6.207 D3 was interviewed by German investigators on five occasions – three times in
December 2006, once in January 2007 and once (at the request of the British police) in September 2010. Transcripts were made of each interview and extensive sections of each of these transcripts were read into the record during DI Mascall's evidence on Day 30 of the Inquiry hearings.190
¶6.208 The core of the account that D3 gave in the course of the interviews was straightforward.
¶6.209 D3 said that he was an old friend of Mr Kovtun, having known him since 1996 when
they both worked as waiters at the Il Porto restaurant in the harbour area of Hamburg. They had kept in touch after both of them had left Il Porto, occasionally meeting up to play chess and have a beer. D3 said that Mr Kovtun had telephoned him on Monday 30 October and asked if they could meet. He wasn't surprised by this – it was normal for Mr Kovtun to call out of the blue and suggest meeting up.
¶6.210 D3 said that they had indeed met up that evening. Initially, Mr Kovtun came to the
Tarantella restaurant where D3 was having a meal with a friend, D5. Later, all three left the restaurant, intending to go to a casino. D5 went ahead, leaving D3 and Mr Kovtun walking alone. This was the point at which, on D3's account, the critical conversation took place.
¶6.211 When he was first interviewed by the German police on 9 December 2006, D3 made
no mention of this conversation at all. He gave a brief narrative of the evening, in which he passed straight from leaving the restaurant, to a short stay in a games arcade on the Steindamm, to returning home.191
¶6.212 However, when D3 was interviewed for a second time, less than two weeks later on
21 December 2006, he gave a far more detailed account. I have set out the critical section of the interview transcript below:192
A: "We all three left the restaurant. We wanted to go to the casino on the Steindamm. Witness D5 went ahead because he wanted to meet somebody. Afterwards he was going to come to the gambling casino, however. I do not know who he wanted to meet. It happened when Dmitri and I were now alone and he told me this tale.
¶Q: What did he say to you word for word?
152A: Dmitri asked whether I knew Litvinenko or had heard of him. I answered no. Dmitri said word for word, 'Litvinenko was a traitor, there is blood on his hands.' He went on to say that Litvinenko does deals with Chechnya and then he asked me whether I knew a cook who was working in London. I told him
¶The Litvinenko Inquiry
witness C2. Witness C2 was a cook at Il Porto and he told me that he wanted to go to England. I cannot say whether witness C2 is his first name or surname. Also, I do not know actually whether witness C2 ever went to England. I gave Dmitri the name without knowing exactly whether he was in fact in England. I cannot remember the exact words. Dmitri said that he had a very expensive poison and needed the cook to administer it to Litvinenko. I cannot remember whether Dmitri said he had the poison. I did not take seriously what Dmitri said. I thought it was just talk.
¶Q: Try once more to remember the exact words?
A: Kovtun said, 'I need this cook to put poison in Litvinenko's food or drink.' He also said the poison is very expensive. As I have said already I did not take him seriously. I said to him he was crazy. The cook is married, I meant witness C2, it would be much easier to shoot Litvinenko, I said jokingly. Kovtun said after that, 'It is meant to set an example.' I answered that he should stop this nonsense. I asked him in addition why he told me of all people. I did not say anything more on this subject after that.
¶Q: Did he say anything else on the way to the casino?
A: He said he would soon have his own flat in Moscow. I replied that that would be nice and I could come and visit him there."
¶6.213 D3 added that he did not think that Mr Kovtun had been drunk at the time of this
conversation. He said that Mr Kovtun had behaved normally for the rest of the evening. They had spent only a short time at the casino and had then both gone back to sleep at D3's flat. He said that Mr Kovtun had left early the next morning.
¶6.214 D3 was subsequently asked again about this conversation at an interview with the
German investigators in January 2007,193 and again at the interview in September 2010.194 On both occasions, D3 gave the same basic account of this conversation. There were some variations in what he said, but none were significant.
¶6.215 D3 was also asked during both of these interviews why he had not given this account
at the time of his first interview. He answered at some length.195 In summary, he said that he had been – and remained – afraid to be involved in what he described as "this huge affair". He said that initially he had hoped that the police "could solve this case alone". His fears appear to have included a concern for his physical safety – for example, he said that he was worried that "something may also happen to me" – but he was clear that Mr Kovtun had never threatened him, including in at least one telephone conversation that had taken place since Mr Litvinenko's death.
¶6.216 Mr Kovtun provided a response to D3's evidence in his statement dated 2 June 2015.
¶He said:196
153"I would add that during that meeting D-3 and his friend [D5] were smoking heroin; I was shocked to see D-3 doing this because he had never done it before. [D5] by contrast, is a heroin addict with a long record for using hard drugs. I was very pained by those circumstances. It is entirely possible that it was in fact the use of
¶Part 6 | Chapters 1 to 8 | The polonium trail – events in October and November 2006
heroin that would explain the preposterous and untruthful statements made by witness D-3 in relation to me. I should be grateful if you would verify the fact that the witness D-3 uses heroin."
¶6.217 Mr Kovtun did not identify precisely what he meant by D3's "preposterous and
untruthful statements", and since he declined to give oral evidence to the Inquiry it was not possible to ask him to be more specific. I assume that he rejects the entirety of the alleged conversation that I have set out above.
¶6.218 Equally, the fact that D3 did not give oral evidence meant that I was unable to explore
with him Mr Kovtun's allegations about his drug use, and what I take to be Mr Kovtun's contention that D3's account of his conversation with Mr Kovtun was either imagined or distorted as a result of having taken heroin that evening.
¶6.219 I will make my findings as to what I think really took place between Mr Kovtun and
D3 in Hamburg that evening when I set out my conclusions at the end of this Report. Ultimately, this issue boils down to which of the two men has been truthful in the accounts that they have given. That does not mean, of course, that those accounts are all that I have to go on. The truthfulness of this part of Mr Kovtun's evidence is something that I can and must judge alongside the truthfulness of the rest of the evidence that he has given. In this case, that includes his evidence as to how and why he did in fact make contact with C2 after he arrived in London later that week. That is an issue to which I will turn in the next chapter of this Part.
¶Mr Kovtun obtains C2's phone number 6.220 In his 2 June 2015 witness statement, Mr Kovtun gave his account of how he obtained
¶C2's telephone number. He said:197
"During my visit to Hamburg in the period between 28 October and 1 November I met my former employer, the owner of 'Il Porto' restaurant, [D4]. He gave me the telephone number of [D7] (manager of the 'Il Porto' restaurant in Hamburg), and [D7] passed on [C2]'s telephone number in Great Britain."
¶6.221 The other evidence available to me suggests that this account is broadly accurate, but that Mr Kovtun in fact obtained C2's number from D6, and not D7.
¶6.222 D6 gave oral evidence by video link from Hamburg.198 He said that he had formerly
154worked at Il Porto as a barman and a waiter and that he had known Mr Kovtun during his time there. He stated that Mr Kovtun had called him in 2006, explaining that he had got D6's phone number from their former boss, D4. Mr Kovtun had asked D6 whether he had a telephone number for C2 in England. D6 did not have C2's number. However, he said that he rang another former colleague from Il Porto days, D7, who did have C2's number. D6 explained that D7 had spoken to C2 and asked for his consent to pass his number to Mr Kovtun; C2 had agreed. D6 said that D7 then passed the number to him, and he had then texted C2's number to Mr Kovtun. D6 said that this had all taken place in a single day. He could not remember the date, but he thought that it was a day or two before a Union of European Football Associations (UEFA) cup match. He also said that it was the day when Mr Kovtun was travelling to the UK.
¶The Litvinenko Inquiry
¶6.223 D7's evidence, which consisted of transcripts of interviews with German investigators,
was read.199 The transcripts showed that, although he had initially denied it, D7 had ultimately given an account that was consistent with D6's story. D7 said:200
"I was at the workplace, under stress, and D6 called me and said Dmitri wanted to go to London and he wanted to have C2's telephone number. I said, I am sorry I cannot give him the telephone number if I do not know why he needs it. Subsequently I [called] C2 briefly and asked him whether I could pass on his telephone number. C2 said I can pass on the telephone number to him and 10 minutes later D6 called me again, and I gave him C2's telephone number."
¶6.224 C2 gave evidence confirming D7's account.201
¶6.225 The telephone schedule shows a call from D7 to C2 at 7.14pm on the evening of
155Tuesday 31 October 2006.202 It would therefore appear that the exchanges between Mr Kovtun, D6, D7 and C2 took place on that day. This is broadly consistent with D6's memory, since 31 October was Mr Kovtun's last day in Hamburg before he flew to London very early the next morning, and was also two days before a Champions League football match between Arsenal and CSKA Moscow. It was also, of course, the day after Mr Kovtun's evening with D3.
¶Part 6 | Chapters 1 to 8 | The polonium trail – events in October and November 2006