British agents probe former Russian spy’s mysterious collapse
LONDON — As clues emerged Tuesday in the case of the Russian ex-spy who was struck down in a British city by a sudden lifethreatening ailment, one name cropped up again and again: Alexander Litvinenko.
Litvinenko was the former Russian intelligence officer and outspoken Kremlin critic who died an agonizing death in London in 2006 from poisoning with radioactive polonium-210. A decade later, a British inquiry blamed Russian intelligence for targeting him, with President Vladimir Putin’s likely blessing.
British officials strenuously cautioned against any premature casting of blame in the collapse Sunday of a man identified as Sergei Skripal, 66, who was given refuge in the United Kingdom after a spy-centric 2010 prisoner swap with Russia.
But, reflecting the extraordinary circumstances, British authorities also said the investigation was being led by counterintelligence personnel, and the government of Prime Minister Theresa May warned of serious consequences for any parties found responsible.
Moscow denied any knowledge of what befell Skripal, who — together with a 33-year-old woman named Tuesday in news reports as his daughter, Yulia — was found semi-paralyzed and vomiting on a bench outside a shopping centre in the British cathedral city of Salisbury.
Both he and his daughter, who was reported to have been visiting from Russia, remained in critical condition and under intensive care, officials said Tuesday.
A statement from London’s Metropolitan Police said Tuesday that counterterrorism investigators had taken the lead in the case because of “unusual circumstances” requiring specialized expertise, but said it was not yet being treated as a terrorist incident.
“This has been a fast-paced investigation, and our focus has been on what caused these people to become critically ill, and whether or not criminal activity took place,” said Kier Pritchard, the chief constable of Wiltshire, the county where Salisbury is located.
Police said there was no indication of risk to the public, although emergency personnel called to the scene had undergone medical checks.
British Foreign Secretary Boris Johnson, speaking to members of Parliament on Tuesday, invoked the Litvinenko case, although he was careful to draw only a theoretical comparison — at least so far.
Citing “echoes of the death of Alexander Litvinenko,” Johnson told lawmakers: “I say to governments around the world that no attempt to take innocent life on [British] soil will go unsanctioned or unpunished.”
Without blaming the Kremlin for attacking Skripal, Johnson described Russia as a “malign and disruptive force.”
Other observers suggested it would take a long time for the full facts to come to light.
Oliver Bullough, a journalist who wrote extensively about the Litvinenko case, noted that a decade elapsed before a British inquiry reached a conclusion. It’s too early to determine whether Russia struck at Skripal just as British officials said it did at Litvinenko, Bullough said, but “the parallels are pretty stark.”
“Again, it’s a former Russian intelligence officer living in refuge in the U.K. who has taken ill after exposure to an unknown substance,” he said.
The Kremlin, for a second day, professed puzzlement Tuesday over the events in Salisbury, and offered to assist authorities in the investigation. Putin allies were quick to accuse Britain, and the West in general, of seeking to sabotage the Russian president in advance of this month’s election.