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The widow of Alexander Litvinenko and friends of the murdered former Russian security agent have stepped up efforts to secure the prosecution of his killers, amid fears that Russia has succeeded in blocking investigations.
Marina Litvinenko held back tears yesterday as she announced the creation of a foundation,
backed by £500,000 ($1.37 million) from exiled Russian billionaire Boris Berezovsky, to step up political pressure for the extradition of suspects.
"I will not rest until Sasha's killers are brought to justice," she said, using the diminutive form of her husband's name.
Speaking softly in English, the woman who watched her 43-year-old husband die in agony in hospital from radiation poisoning last November added: "I cannot say what I feel against the people who would do this because I do not know exactly who did it. I would like to know who did it.
"What I do is just for Sasha and his memory, for his son and for all people who should not expect this."
The Litvinenko Justice Foundation will also help to seek compensation and legal redress for the 200 people thought to have been exposed to traces of the radioactive polonium-210 that killed Litvinenko. But the foundation itself will not pay compensation.
Asked whether the foundation had been set up because the investigation appeared to have stalled, Litvinenko's friend Alex Goldfarb described the Russian probe as "nothing but a stunt, a PR exercise".
He said the only function of the Russian inquiry had been to "obstruct the truth".
Russia opened its own investigation, mirroring a Scotland Yard inquiry, after two Russians who were with Litvinenko in a Mayfair hotel when he was poisoned were reported to have fallen ill in Moscow with polonium-210 poisoning.
Scotland Yard believes former KGB officer Andrei Lugovoi to be the prime suspect, but the Crown Prosecution Service has yet to decide whether to seek extradition. However the Russian prosecutor-general has refused any extradition, which has alarmed Litvinenko's friends and his wife's lawyer, Louise Christian.
In an open letter to Prime Minister Tony Blair, Home Secretary John Reid and the Attorney-General, Lord Goldsmith, the foundation said: "We write to you to seek reassurance that you and your colleagues are doing everything possible to make sure that suspects will stand trial in the UK and will not be shielded from justice by the Russian state."
The letter appeared to suggest that political considerations might be holding up the judicial process.
Berezovsky repeated his belief that President Vladimir Putin was responsible for Litvinenko's death, and accused him of holding a long-standing grudge against his former subordinate. Litvinenko would have been considered a traitor by stalwarts of the FSB, the successor to the KGB, for going public with accusations that it had attempted to assassinate Berezovsky when Putin was FSB chief.
"Putin hated Alexander as a personal enemy. He is a small person who will never forget that someone damaged him," said Berezovsky, a former ally of Putin who is now his sworn enemy and wanted in Britain on corruption charges.
Berezovsky and former Chechen rebel spokesman Akhmad Zakayev agreed to be interviewed by Russian police at the end of last week at a London police station. But Berezovsky said their questions, focusing on his financial affairs, appeared to be more like those of tax police than murder investigators.
Russian authorities have suggested that Berezovsky may have been responsible for the death of Litvinenko, who formerly worked for him, a suggestion which the exiled billionaire has described as ridiculous.
Berezovsky suggested that Litvinenko might have been killed because he was investigating possible money-laundering by Roman Abramovich, the owner of Chelsea football team, and Putin in Spain. He did not provide details.
- INDEPENDENT