It traces the death of Alexander Litvinenko in 2006 and highlights the kleptocratic mess that has become post-Soviet Russia. Yet, he was also a husband and a father. On November 1, 2006, journalist and Russian dissident Alexander Litvinenko was poisoned in London. This book had me hanging on every word. A man who was trying to provide for his family, having fled his country and moved to London to start a new life.In London, 2006, Alexander Litvinenko was poisoned. But it is the book that got him murdered. Some of the more recent things I was aware of. After the reversal of the decision on February 9 and the granting of a short-term visa, Harding chose not to seek a further visa extension.“In fact, the aim is to blur what is true with what is not, to the point that the truth disappears altogether. President Putin’s musings this week that Bashar al-Assad, viewed as the main obstacle to a deal between the Damascus regime and the opposition, may be given refuge in Russia, illustrates the aces he holds.The British government initially refused to hold a public inquiry into Mr Litvinenko’s death.
Litvinenko had fallen out with the Russian government and became a strong critic of the Kremlin, obtaining political asylum after coming to Britain in 2000.
“Both Lugovoi and Kovtun had plenty of opportunities to present their case. Oddly, the incompetent assassins left a trail of radioactivity of deadly polonium from Russia to London that made it easy to track their precise movements and pinpoint the teapot and time at which the poisoning occurred. It was haunting and fascinating then and is no less so 11 years later, particularly in light of all that has happenened since in Putin's Russia.
Mr Kovtun suddenly offered, after the inquiry began, to give evidence via videolink.
I mean, I knew he had people killed for disagreeing with him and his regime, but I was unaware of the exact extent of it. The most chilling character in the book is Vladimir Putin who almost certainly ordered the assassination to avoid Litvinenko's publication of a bA compulsively readable account of the assassination of Alexander Litvinenko, a Russian who immigrated to London in fear of his life.
This book’s subject matter is even more intriguing than the first.This story is BONKERS and it's also true. The waiting was painful,” she told The Independent.“Maybe this could have been done five years ago instead of ten. “He is deeply interested in Russia, Russian literature, Russian politics,” said Mrs Litvinenko.
The poisoning that this book focuses on (although it does explore others) was done in 2006 and the British government did not call Putin out on it, although a 2015 study by a UK judge found that it was probable that Putin was behind the 2006 poisoning of Alexander Litvinenko. Why was it that a weapon of mass destruction was used to carry out a murder in Britain?“Questions have been raised about Mr Putin [that] he needs to answer. But even if Lugovoi and Kovtun cannot be extradited, what kind of relation can this country have with people who could have organised this kind of terrorism in the British capital? Polonium—a rare, lethal, and highly radioactive substance. The author Luke Harding is a British journalist who worked for The Guardian and have spent several years as a foreign correspondent in Russia.
The most chilling character in the book is Vladimir Putin who almost certainly ordered the assassination to avoid Litvinenko's publication of a book tracing linkages among Russian mafia, ruling oligarchs and Putin.