Blowing up Russia: The Book that Got Litvinenko Murdered

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Photograph: Natasja Weitsz/Getty Images View image in fullscreen Alexander Litvinenko a few days before his death.

Even prior to that, while there were many books on the subject, more than a few were either conspiracist in nature or had an axe to grind. As an agent in Russia’s FSB, Litvinenko blew the whistle on systemic corruption and was persecuted for it. On the second trip, one assassin appears to have knocked over the container of poison, mopped it up, and left the towel out for the maid.The funeral procession straggled through the puddles of a tree-lined avenue, an outsized coffin perched precariously on the shoulders of eleven ill-matched pallbearers. Finance is provided by PayPal Credit (a trading name of PayPal UK Ltd, Whittaker House, Whittaker Avenue, Richmond-Upon-Thames, Surrey, United Kingdom, TW9 1EH). All the proof of Litvinenko's assertions are there, but it needs the skill on a good editor to sort it out into a more readable narrative. MI6 judged this whistleblowing book to be the reason for his assassination with Polonium-210 in London in 2006.

The one thing they all had in common was nuisance value in varying degrees - to the Russian State/Putin. Claiming Alexander Litvinenko was a former KGB spy, news reports said he blamed Vladimir Putin for poisoning him with polonium. Perhaps the author wanted to compile the latest available evidence on the criminal and ruthless nature of the Putin regime to bolster the case made by the Litvinenko inquiry – though that hardly seems necessary. Are MI6 and 5 more incompetent than the KSB and if that is so are they also as corrupt if my analogy is to stand ?As the mourners filed past, I picked out some unknown faces among the familiar crowd of exiled oligarchs and their acolytes – one unknown man in a leather jacket, another smoking a cigarette despite the solemnity of the occasion. Putin and the Russian state are bad enough as they are - as Harding amply demonstrates in his forensic analysis of Litvinenko’s murder - without having to overegg the pudding. Then there was the inquiry’s own report, which presented a well-written record of the evidence reviewed and a rigorous argument that supported the conclusion. For clues as to who wanted Alexander Litvinenko dead, you need look no farther than his book Blowing Up Russia".