Dead exile link to spy’s ‘killer’
AN EXILED Russian whistleblower died in the UK in mysterious circumstances after winning a legal battle against a company linked to the suspected killer of Alexander Litvinenko, an inquest heard yesterday.
Alexander Perepilichnyy, 44, died while jogging near his €3.4million Surrey mansion. He had sought refuge in Britain after helping Swiss prosecutors with a €170million money-laundering probe involving Russian officials, leading to speculation he may have been murdered in a KGB-style hit.
But Mr Perepilichnyy was also the defendant in a series of Russian lawsuits brought by Dzhirsa LLC, a Moscowbased consultancy linked to former KGB agent Dmitry Kovtun. A 2016 report found Kovtun and another ex-KGB agent killed former Russian spy Mr Litvinenko, poisoning him with radioactive polonium-210 in 2006, in an attack ‘probably’ authorised by Vladimir Putin.
Yesterday, an inquest at London’s Old Bailey into Mr Perepilichnyy’s death heard Dzhirsa had bought his debts – linked to disputes over loans and bonds worth millions of euro – and tried to enforce them through the courts.
In a 2012 interview, Kovtun said he had been invited by friends to become a director of Dzhirsa because he enjoyed a ‘certain reputation’.
He was also reported to have said people called them ‘the military men’ as former officers sorted out their disputes, the inquest heard. Giving evidence over videolink, Dmitry Lipkin, a lawyer who represented Mr Perepilichnyy in the Russian lawsuits, said his client had won after proving it was not his signature on documents and that he had not received the loan he was pursued for.
Peter Skelton QC, for the coroner, asked: ‘Is Dzhirsa the type of company that, if it doesn’t succeed in court, may resort to a threat of physical violence?’ Mr Lipkin replied: ‘I don’t know.’
Asked if he was aware of the link between Dzhirsa and Kovtun, he said: ‘I don’t remember.’
There had been speculation Mr Perepilichnyy was poisoned with a rare plant slipped into his soup. Botanist Professor Monique Simmonds, of the Royal Botanic Gardens in Kew, London, told the inquest she had not identified any plant toxins in specimens she tested.
The inquest continues.