|
Ex-spy's deathbed charge: It was Putin
LONDON -- In a chilling accusation dictated and signed just hours before he lapsed into a coma and died, a former KGB agent fingered Russian President Vladimir Putin as the man ultimately responsible for his death after a suspected poisoning shrouded in mystery.
Putin denied the allegation as medical experts and criminal investigators tried to unravel a case that has perplexed them for three weeks.
British officials announced Friday that a "major dose" of polonium-210, a hard-to-detect radioactive substance, had been found in the urine of the former agent, Alexander Litvinenko. Scotland Yard said it also had found traces of the substance in Litvinenko's London home, at a sushi bar where he ate with a colleague and at a hotel where he met two Russian men on the day he fell ill.
Standing before a cluster of cameras and reporters Friday outside London's University College Hospital where Litvinenko, 43, was pronounced dead Thursday evening, his close friend Alexander Goldfarb read the former spy's final statement:
"You have shown yourself to have no respect for life, liberty or any civilized value. You have shown yourself to be unworthy of your office, to be unworthy of the trust of civilized men and women
__________________
|
30th November 2006, 02:47
Linear Mode
