Alexander Litvinenko

Alexander Valterovich Litvinenko used to be an intelligence officer for the Russians. He specialized in counter-terrorism and infiltration of organized crime. That means he knew sensitive things about what criminals in Russia were doing. He also knew about terrorism and about how much the Russian Government is or isn’t doing to prevent terrorism in the west. What did he know? What could he have revealed? It seems he knew that bad men higher up in his organization had arranged for Russian the murder of a very rich and influential Russian, Boris Berezovsky.

Arests and trials
Litvineko was arrested for exceeding his authority not for saying anything untrue and was aqquitted after enduring the harsh conditions of a Russian remand centre for nine months. .

He was twice tried and acquitted twice for revealing what the Russians didn't want people to know. Then he was charged a third time. Russia doesn’t respect the rule against Double-Jeopardy.

Litvineko in Britain
Litvineko fled to Britain where he wrote two books, "Blowing up Russia: Terror from within" and "Lubyanka Criminal Group". In these books he said that Russian agents had done terrorist acts which included blowing up whole blocks of flats in order to get Vladimir Putin into power and of arranging to get journalist Anna Politkovskaya murdered. Alexander Litvinenko was a very brave man as he knew what these murderers are capable of doing and must have known that he was risking his life. We honour his sacrifice.

Andrey Lugovoy allegedly poisoned him in the U.K. in 2006. The public will never find out if he knew even more. Obviously one of the best things Russia could have done to discredit him would be to let him live. The poison was radioactive and cost $100 million but Russia refuse to extradite the guy who did it so now the British got very angry at the Russians. To make things worse Lugovoy is now a member of Russian Parliament, which is showing how little the Russians care, when you really think about it. Naturally the United Kingdom government expects people to be safe from foreign attack when on British soil. Since the poisonning relations between the UK and Russia have been strained.