Alexander Valterovich Litvinenko (Александр Вальтерович Литвиненко, 1962-2006) was a former officer of Russia’s Federal Security Service (FSB) who fled to Britain in 2000 and became a critic of the FSB and Vladimir Putin. On November 1, 2006, he drank tea laced with polonium-210 at the Millennium Hotel in London’s Mayfair, during a meeting with former KGB officer Andrei Lugovoy and Dmitry Kovtun. He died at University College Hospital on November 23, 2006.

The British public inquiry chaired by Sir Robert Owen reported on January 21, 2016 that Lugovoy and Kovtun deliberately poisoned Litvinenko, that the operation was probably directed by the FSB, and that it was probably approved by FSB director Nikolai Patrushev and by President Putin. Russia refused British requests to extradite the two men. In September 2021 the European Court of Human Rights found Russia responsible for the killing. The case is a reference point for later Russian state poisonings, including the 2018 Novichok attack in Salisbury.

Sources

• Owen, Sir Robert. The Litvinenko Inquiry: Report into the Death of Alexander Litvinenko. HC 695. Her Majesty’s Stationery Office, January 21, 2016.
• European Court of Human Rights. Carter v. Russia, judgment. September 21, 2021.

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