The Litvinenko Inquiry

The Litvinenko Inquiry
6.264 C2 himself gave oral evidence to the Inquiry. 241 He said that he had worked for some
years at Il Porto in the 1990s, initially as a kitchen porter and latterly as a chef de partie
(in a statement prepared after he had given evidence, C2 clarified that in his last two
years at Il Porto he worked as head chef when the other chef was absent). 242 In 2000
he had left Germany, returning to his home country of Albania. He had subsequently
travelled to the UK and settled in London. He said that he had known Mr Kovtun at Il
Porto, but that they had not been friends. They had not shared a language, and had
therefore been unable to talk to each other.
6.265 C2 recalled receiving a call from Mr Kovtun on 1 November 2006. He said that at that
time he had not spoken to Mr Kovtun or had any other contact with him for six years.
C2 said that when Mr Kovtun called he was in Stratford in east London. He was in
a coffee shop helping with some menus. He said that the call had been brief. After
Mr Kovtun had introduced himself, he had said (in English) that he was in London
and had suggested meeting up. C2 had said that he was busy, but that he would call
Mr Kovtun back and meet him when he had time. C2 said that that was the end of the
call. He said that it took one minute.
6.266 C2 said that he had called Mr Kovtun back. He struggled to remember how long after
Mr Kovtun’s call this had been. He initially thought that it may have been two or three
weeks later, but he accepted that it might have been (as the telephone schedule
suggests) as soon as the next day. He said that when he did call he suggested to
Mr Kovtun that they meet up. Mr Kovtun had said that he was busy but that he would
see him later. C2 expected him to call back, but he never did.
6.267 Mr Kovtun’s explanation for and account of this episode were strikingly different.
6.268 In his recent statement, Mr Kovtun stated that the reason he had obtained C2’s
phone number and then contacted him in London was that he wanted to ask him to
come to Moscow and work as the chef in a restaurant that he and Mr Lugovoy were
planning to open. He described C2 as his “friend”, and said that he was a specialist
in Mediterranean cuisine. 243 As to his communications with C2 in London, he said as
follows: 244
“at 16.00-17.00 on 1 November 2006 I had a meeting planned with [C2] … who is
my friend and former colleague in the restaurant business in Hamburg to whom
Lugovoy and I wished to offer a job in a restaurant in Moscow. However, in the
presence of my acquaintance Aleksandr Shadrin, in a telephone conversation [C2]
suggested that I come to him for a meeting in a district of London far from the
centre, the name of which I cannot remember. In answer to the question I put to
Shadrin as to how to get to the district named by [C2] and how long it would take
to get there, he replied that at that time of day in London in would take 3-4 hours
to get there because of traffic congestion. Since I did not want to spend such
a long time reaching the meeting place after having flown in from Hamburg, I
agreed with [C2] that we would postpone our meeting until the following day, at a
more convenient time for both of us. [C2] agreed to ring on 2 November 2006 and
discuss the possibility of meeting and the place at which to meet.”
241
C2 24/14-39
242
C2 32/43-44
243
INQ021208 (page 11)
244
INQ021208 (pages 9-10)
162