The Right State

It has been long suspected that ex-KGB spy Alexander Litvinenko had been poisoned by the Kremlin because of his harsh criticism of Russian President Vladimir Putin.  Now it turns out those who suspected foul play may have been right after all.

A rare radioactive substance killed an ex-KGB spy turned Kremlin critic, the British government said Friday. In a dramatic statement written before he died, the man called Russian President Vladimir Putin “barbaric and ruthless” and blamed him personally for the poisoning. (snip)

Litvinenko died late Thursday at a London hospital after spending days in intensive care as doctors puzzled over what was causing his organs to fail and attacking his bone marrow and destroying his immune system.

Britain’s Health Protection Agency said Friday that the radioactive element polonium-210 had been found in his urine, and the police said traces of radiation were found at Litvinenko’s home and a ritzy hotel bar and sushi restaurant he visited on the day he became ill.

Police said they were treating the case as an “unexplained death” – but not yet as a murder.

The 43-year-old Litvinenko, who fiercely criticized Putin’s government from his refuge in London since 2000, told police he believed he was poisoned Nov. 1 while investigating the October slaying of Russian journalist Anna Politkovskaya, another critic of Putin.

Russian critics of Putin seem to die under the most suspicious circumstances.  It is not like Litvinenko slipped on a wet floor and feel on his table knife.  Instead he died of radiation poisoning.  The fact that he died of radiation poisoning should scare anyone, but since the source was a very rare substance should be especially scary.  According to Wikopedia, polonium is so rare that only about 100 grams is produced each year.

Polonium is not one of those extremely dangerous elements like plutonium which releases neutrons, yet it can be absorbed through the skin making the hazardous element difficult to handle.  Instead it releases alpha particles which are easily stopped by the paper or even the skin.  But once ingested in some way, polonium becomes extremely deadly as a dose of 0.12 micrograms (0.000000000264554715 pounds) is deadly to a human.

The rarity of polonium makes the Kremlin a prime suspect for this assassination and by extension, Vladimir Putin since he is the president and a former leader of the KGB.  Everyone who is critical of Putin’s leadership ends up with a severe case of death.  Democracy itself may become a future target of the Russian President.

This poisoning was intended to both kill the intended target and send a message to all other Russian critics they too can be reached.  Assassination can be achieved in a variety of ways, but to kill in this way sends a message loud and clear to every other critic of Vladimir Putin.

Tags: Democracy //