Vladimir Putin 'ordered killing', Litvinenko inquiry hears by GEEZER

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Vladimir Putin 'ordered killing', Litvinenko inquiry hears

POSTED BY: GEEZER
UPDATED: Saturday, August 8, 2015 21:00
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Friday, July 31, 2015 10:44 PM

Keep the Shiny side up

Ben Emmerson QC, for Mr Litvinenko's family, said in his closing statement that Russian state responsibility had been proven "beyond reasonable doubt".

Mr Litvinenko's widow Marina said she believed her husband's "murderers and their paymasters" had "been unmasked".

But the Kremlin told the BBC it did not trust the inquiry.

'Tinpot despot'

Dissident Mr Litvinenko, 43, drank tea containing a fatal dose of radioactive polonium during a meeting with suspects Dmitry Kovtun and Andrei Lugovoi in London in 2006.

The Kremlin wanted Mr Litvinenko dead and provided the poison used to kill him, Mr Emmerson alleged.

Scientific evidence proves Mr Kovtun and Mr Lugovoi killed the former spy, he added.

Mr Emmerson told the inquiry Mr Putin was an "increasingly isolated tinpot despot" and a "morally deranged authoritarian".
He said the Russian president and his allies are "directly implicated in organised crime".

Mr Putin's "personal cabal" are "willing to murder those who stand in their way", Mr Emmerson added.

He said: "If the Russian state is responsible, Vladimir Putin is responsible.
"Not on some analogical version of vicarious liability but because he personally ordered the liquidation of an enemy who was bent on exposing him and his cronies."

The QC said Mr Kovtun had failed to appear before the inquiry because he would be unable to explain the evidence against him.

Mr Kovtun said in March that he wanted to testify, but failed to appear by videolink.

Speaking outside the Royal Courts of Justice after the closing statements, Mrs Litvinenko said she believed "the truth has finally been uncovered".

She said her husband had "vowed to expose corruption" in the Russian Federal Security Service and the "highest echelons of power in Russia".

"His actions were perceived as treachery and he paid the ultimate price for them," she said.

Mrs Litvinenko added: "Any reasonable person who looks at the evidence presented in the inquiry will see my husband was killed by agents of the Russian state in the first ever act of nuclear terrorism in the streets of London.

"This could not have happened without knowledge and consent of Mr Putin."

http://www.bbc.com/news/uk-33734525

Hmm.

Wonder if the Russian government will agree to extradite Mr. Putin.

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Friday, July 31, 2015 11:09 PM

SIGNYM

I believe in solving problems, not sharing them.

As I read various articles on the topic, one of the things that came to mind was that this event indirectly demonstrates that you can't clean up a nuclear facility (such as potentially in Iran) to the point where "no" trace remains.

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BY the way, other British media reports on the inquiry add that Litvinenko also accused Putin of being a pedophile, and that Putin planned and organized the apartment bombing "which killed 239 people and led to the second Chechen war".

http://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/home-news/litvinenko-inquiry-form
erkgb-agent-accused-putin-of-being-a-paedophile-10019687.html

I think the inquiry could use a clearer separation of fact from allegation. Also, you don't "extradite" people unless they're to stand trial. Is a trial against Putin being planned?

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You can't build a nation with bombs. You can't create a society with guns.

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Saturday, August 1, 2015 4:21 PM

JEWELSTAITEFAN

Does this prove that Putin did not invade Ukraine, or shoot down civilian airliners?

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Monday, August 3, 2015 6:11 PM

1KIKI

Goodbye, kind world (George Monbiot) - In common with all those generations which have contemplated catastrophe, we appear to be incapable of understanding what confronts us.

The article and several people in it mentioned that there was 'evidence'. I tried to imagine what kind of 'evidence' would prove Putin was involved, aside from eyewitness testimony, or signed papers. But there was no evidence listed or linked in the article.

So this is yet another instance where the media serves as a mouthpiece for unsubstantiated government claims, that we're supposed to accept as true. Which you obviously do, Geezer.

I remember back when, us science-type people had a giggle over how ridiculously easy it was to get polonium, if you were willing to do a little work dissolving it out of static-busters.

SAGAN: We are releasing vast quantities of carbon dioxide, increasing the greenhouse effect. It may not take much to destabilize the Earth's climate, to convert this heaven, our only home in the cosmos, into a kind of hell.

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Saturday, August 8, 2015 8:51 PM

THGRRI

Putin is doing little more than residing over a cartel.

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Saturday, August 8, 2015 8:59 PM

SIGNYM

I believe in solving problems, not sharing them.

Polonium anti-static strips.

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You can't build a nation with bombs. You can't create a society with guns.

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Saturday, August 8, 2015 9:00 PM

SIGNYM

I believe in solving problems, not sharing them.

Quote:
Originally posted by THGRRI:
Putin is doing little more than residing over a cartel.

Can say the same about Obama.

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You can't build a nation with bombs. You can't create a society with guns.

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