Lugovoi claims UK 'behind Litvinenko poisoning'

The man that the British government have accused of poisoning ex-KGB agent Alexander Litvinenko has made the bizarre claim that MI6 had already recruited Litvineko and also tried to recruit him.

Andrei Lugovoi, who the British authorities are attempting to have extradited to Britain to face charges, claims that the murder could not have been carried out without MI6's connivance. Russia is claiming that it is against Russian law to extradite a Russian citizen.

Litvinenko's murder was perhaps one of the most strange murders in recent years as it involved the use of the radioactive isotope polonium-210. Countless British citizens could have been exposed to contamination which is why Blair's government are not relying on diplomatic niceties. And Lugovoi's bizarre claim that MI6 were involved in the murder sounds like something that can simply be dismissed on it's face. Why would MI6 want to kill Litvinenko?

And, as Litvinenko had fallen out with Putin since around the late 1990's and had written a book alleging that FSB agents co-ordinated the 1999 apartment block bombings in Moscow that killed more than 300 people, there are surely more obvious suspects who would have wanted him dead than MI6?

The Russian government has always blamed Chechen separatists for the apartment block blasts and later that year Russia poured troops into Chechnya in a new offensive.

A former KGB officer and British agent, Oleg Gordievsky, described Mr Lugovoi's claims as "silly fantasies". He denied Mr Litvinenko had been working for the British secret services.

"He used to be... a member of the FSB, it is a domestic organisation of the KGB, and MI6 is not interested in information about the domestic service, so Litvinenko was not needed," he told BBC News.

Lugovoi is blatantly responding according to orders from the Kremlin who appear to have decided to brass this one out, but I doubt there are many who will buy their version of events. Indeed, the collision course between Blair and Putin now appears unavoidable. With journalists falling out of windows left and right in Russia, Putin does appear to be acting like some kind of Mafioso knocking out the competition.

But even against that backdrop, Lugovoi's story is straining credulity.

Mr Lugovoi said that either British foreign intelligence agency MI6, the Russian mafia, or fugitive Kremlin opponent Boris Berezovsky were behind the killing.

Mr Lugovoi said that, like Mr Litvinenko, Mr Berezovsky was working for the British secret services, but that the two men had a falling out and that MI6 could no longer control Mr Litvinenko.

Mr Berezovsky, who has been granted asylum in Britain, has denied any involvement in Mr Litvinenko's death.

On Thursday, Mr Berezovsky said that it was now "clearer than ever" that the Kremlin was behind the murder.

"Everything about Mr Lugovoi's words and presentation made it obvious that he is acting on Kremlin instruction. If Mr Lugovoi would like to prove his innocence, I suggest again that he travel to London and face trial in the UK courts," he said in a statement.

Mr Lugovoi said he was "openly recruited as the British security service agent. They asked me to collect any... compromising information about President Putin and the members of his family".

He said he was initially asked to find economic information, but he said the large fees he was paid made him realise he was being recruited to do more than that.

He went on to say that he lacked the motive to kill Mr Litvinenko.

"Sasha [Litvinenko] was not my enemy. I didn't feel cold or hot from whatever he was doing, from the books that he was writing. I've been in business for a long time and I was not really interested," he said.

Mr Lugovoi is also ignoring the fact that a polonium-210 trail has been left all over London, including at London's Millennium Mayfair Hotel where Lugovoi had lunch with Litvinenko, the day he took ill.

Indeed, one can't help feeling that it is not the murder of Litvinenko on British soil that the British government are enraged about as much as the method of killing chosen. This was dangerous beyond measure and smacks of desperate recklessness.

No government can sit back whilst a crime of this type is carried out in it's capital. But all the indications are that Putin is not going to give an inch. The G8 should be fun....