The Litvinenko Inquiry

The Litvinenko Inquiry
that rehearsed the allegations – which he arranged to be shown (with some fanfare,
it would seem) in March 2002 at the Royal United Services Institute in London. 29
Mr Berezovsky commissioned Mr Felshtinsky and Mr Litvinenko to try to gather further
evidence about what had happened in 1999. In Moscow, Mr Berezovsky encouraged
and supported the establishment of a Commission to conduct a public investigation
into the allegations. I heard that the Commission had about 15 members, including
politicians, lawyers and journalists, as well as the daughter of one of the victims of the
bombings. The Commission was founded jointly by a Member of Parliament (MP) and
“old-time Russian dissident” 30 named Sergei Kovalyov and another MP named Sergei
Yushenkov. Another of its members was Yuri Shchekochikhin, a journalist who had
written for Novaya Gazeta about corruption in URPO at the time of Mr Litvinenko’s
press conference. 31
4.38 The evidence shows that Mr Litvinenko was very much involved in this activity.
I summarise. He helped to promote the film. He undertook further investigations with
Mr Felshtinsky, including travelling with him to Georgia to try to interview a Chechen
named Ahmed Gochiyaev, who was said by the Russian authorities to have been
the mastermind behind the bombings. 32 He publicly supported the Commission in
Moscow by appearing at its hearings via videolink. He drew his friend Mr Trepashkin
into working with Mr Yushenkov; Mr Trepashkin undertook his own investigations in
Moscow and discovered, for example, evidence that Mr Gochiyaev had been framed. 33
Mr Litvinenko also made initial enquiries into separate allegations that the FSB might
have been involved in perpetrating the Moscow theatre siege in October 2002, another
mass casualty event that had been blamed by the Russian authorities on Chechen
terrorists. Mr Litvinenko’s enquiries into this matter involved trying to trace a Chechen
named Mr Terkibayev; I heard that these enquiries were subsequently pursued by
Mr Yushenkov, and later by Ms Politkovskaya. 34
4.39 It appears that not only was Mr Litvinenko deeply involved in these interrelated
activities, but that he became something of a public figurehead for the whole enterprise.
Mr Goldfarb referred, in this context, to: “an understanding in our circle that Sasha
would be essentially the face of the campaign to inform the public opinion and the
powers that be that the FSB might have been involved in the apartment bombings.” 35
4.40 I heard that Mr Litvinenko’s second book was written between 2001 and 2002. It was
written in Russian and, although subsequently translated into Polish and Bulgarian, an
English translation has never been produced. 36 Its title translates as The Gang from
the Lubyanka. Like Blowing Up Russia, this book was also funded by Mr Berezovsky.
I heard from Marina Litvinenko and from Mr Goldfarb that the book took the form of
transcripts of interviews between Mr Litvinenko and a Russian journalist named Akram
Murtazaev, which had been edited by Mr Goldfarb. The book contained a record of
Mr Litvinenko’s own experiences in Russia in the years before he had left, as well
as allegations of corruption and other criminality on behalf of the FSB in general and
Mr Putin in particular. 37 The book was published in early 2002 by a company that
29
Goldfarb 26/17; Bell 6/18
30
Goldfarb 5/122
31
Goldfarb 5/122-123; 26/17-18; 26/26
32
Goldfarb 26/19-21; Felshtinsky 23/153-157
33
Goldfarb 26/20-21
34
Goldfarb 5/128; 26/23-25
35
Goldfarb 27/110
36
Marina Litvinenko 3/133
37
Marina Litvinenko 3/133-134; Goldfarb 5/77-79
58