John Rapley

LONDON:

Back in the Cold War, Russians in London were exotic creatures. Today, the city seems to have become a magnet for migrants from all over the former Soviet bloc. From the barmaids behind pub counters to shady billionaires who sink their dubiously-gotten gains into equally-dubious football clubs, the British capital has become a home away from home for tens of thousands of Russian emigrants.

Along with the legitimate migrants have come characters from spy novels or gangster movies. And the webs of intrigue they spin seem now to be swirling around the case that has fascinated Londoners during this unusually warm autumn: the death of Alexander Litvinenko.

A few weeks ago, Mr. Litvinenko died mysteriously in a London hospital. A former Soviet secret agent, he had become a critic of Russian president Vladimir Putin.

Rare radioactive substance

Mr. Litvinenko claimed the Kremlin was out to get him and had arranged for its agents to poison him. At first, doctors couldn't determine the cause of his death. But it soon emerged that Mr. Litvinenko had indeed been poisoned by a rare radioactive substance, polonium-210.

Moreover, post-mortem tests subsequently uncovered that the quantity of polonium used far exceeded the dose needed to cause death.

Only two sources seemed likely to be able to obtain such large quantities of polonium. The first suspect would be a government with a nuclear programme, or in any event a government security agency. Russia seemed the obvious candidate. This is the story to which Mr. Litvinenko's family is sticking. They are insisting that the Kremlin ordered Mr. Litvinenko killed because he had become inconvenient.

To nobody's surprise the Kremlin is denying the charge. It is pointing out that in contrast to his claims, Mr. Litvinenko had never been a high-ranking spy. The Kremlin thus had no reason to fear him.

Some security analysts are inclined to take Moscow at its word. They suggest it would never have ordered a hit like this one, since everybody knew that suspicion would immediately fall on Moscow. They speculate that the reason such a large quantity of polonium was employed was precisely because the culprit wanted to be noticed, as if to send a message.

Thus, some people speculate that somebody ordered Mr. Litvinenko killed in order to embarrass the Kremlin. One theory is that rogue elements in the Russian security establishment, who want to destabilise the administration and turn the West against Russia, killed Mr. Litvinenko in order to weaken Mr. Putin.

But there is a third theory, one that is circulating in the Russia media. It suggests that Mr. Litvinenko had been involved in the underground trade in nuclear materials. Either his direct involvement got him poisoned, or a deal went bad and Mr. Litvinenko took the hit for it.

'Dirty bomb'

One variant of the theory goes further. It points to Mr. Litvinenko's known sympathies with Chechen rebels, and hints that he might have been involved in the smuggling of materials to make a 'dirty bomb'.

It all gets pretty far-fetched. But the thing is that in post-communist Russia, there is very little that is too far-fetched to be possible. During the Soviet era, the communist party built up vast networks of patronage, some of which operated overtly, others covertly. When communism collapsed, these networks fragmented. Some went into legitimate enterprise, others into crime. But they remained intertwined. This has given Russian capitalism its character of dubious dealings and criminal undertones.

So a bizarre criminal or terrorist link might not be out of the question. But if the job was properly done, we will probably never know.

John Rapley is a senior lecturer in the Department of Government, UWI, Mona.