Interpol joins investigation into killing of former Russian spy

13 April 2012

Interpol has joined the investigation into the killing of former Russian agent Alexander Litvinenko, the Interfax news agency reported today.

The investigation so far has pulled in witnesses in three countries: Britain, where Litvinenko fell sick and died after being poisoned with polonium-210, Russia and Germany. Some of the men who met with Litvinenko before he fell ill traveled from Moscow and Hamburg to London.

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British investigators on Monday questioned Andrei Lugovoi, a key witness in the killing, in the Moscow hospital where he was undergoing radiation checks, Russian news reports said. Lugovoi told the agencies that he had been questioned for three hours.

"I gave testimony exclusively as a witness. I was officially informed of that before the interrogation," the ITAR-Tass news agency quoted him as saying. "They made no charges against me."

Lugovoi said the results of his medical tests would be known later this week but said he was "unlikely" to make them public.

German authorities, meanwhile, found traces of polonium-210, the rare radioactive substance that killed Litvinenko, in locations visited by Dmitry Kovtun, another Russian contact, before his November 1 meeting with Litvinenko. The Russian Prosecutor General's office said Kovtun had been diagnosed with radiation poisoning.

Lugovoi told the RIA Novosti news agency Monday that Kovtun was in stable condition and "feeling normal."

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