I was on list of R ussian targets with poison victim

MI6 spirited Britain’s top Cold War double agent out of Russia in 1985 in the boot of a Ford saloon. He has provided British Intelligence with information ever since.

A US-born British financier banned from Russia in 2005. Interpol rejected Russian extradition requests after Browder was sentenced in his absence to nine years for tax fraud. chaired a meeting of the government’s emergency committee, Cobra, to discuss the attempted murder.

Karpichkov says he learned of his death sentence on his birthday, February 12, in a chilling warning from an ex-colleague.

It is the third time he has been a target since he defected 20 years ago. In 2006 he was warned by MI5 to skip the country because his life was in danger. He fled to New Zealand, where the first of two chemical attacks took place that November – the week Russian defector Alexander Litvinenko was poisoned.

He told how a “beggar” tried to grab his laptop bag, and in the same moment he felt a “gust” on his face.

The spy recalls: “He’d sprayed some sort of powder on me. I walked 50 to 100 metres, then felt like the earth was spinning. I was light-headed, dizzy, felt sweaty and like I was about to black out.”

The “beggar” let go of the bag and walked off. Karpichkov adds: “My nose and eyes started running and I began developing flu-like symptoms.

“A rash appeared on my chest. Within a couple of months I’d lost 66lb, I was a walking corpse. I was sure I would die.”

Medical records seen by the Sunday People show poisoning was suspected, though never proved. He fell ill again