This letter is associated with the following article:
Letters
Friday, December 1, 2006 12:00 AM

Who poisoned the KGB agent?

Only a state with a highly sophisticated nuclear program could kill a person with a radioactive toxin.

Read other letters about this article

  • Friday, December 1, 2006 09:57 PM

    Okay I lied, I can't stop

    Look up Pichugin, Gorin, and Nevzlin.

    This is what I found on a blog about the murder of the Gorins:

    http://www.russiablog.org/2006/08/exyukos_security_chief_gets_20.php

    In 2002, Sergei Gorin was a senior manager at Menatep Bank's branch in the city of Tambov, where he arranged several lucrative off-the-books deals between Yukos and local businesses. These arrangements seemed to have worked fine until Mr. Gorin got ambitious and asked Mr. Pichugin to either bring him on board as a well-compensated Yukos employee or give him $100,000 cash in severance pay.

    At this point, a criminal court found, Pichugin went to the Gorins residence, beat up their terrified children, then locked the kids in a bathroom while he waited for the parents to come home. When the Gorins arrived, they were dragged into another room and murdered, and then the killer disposed of the bodies.

    Pichugin was the security chief for Yukos, the company Dick Dresner and George Gorton were advised to buy shares of when they were "spinning Boris" to reelection in 1996 by making his opponent look like a Stalinist.

    By the way, Leonid Nevzlin was one of the main contributors and organizers of that campaign.

    It goes on further about Nevzlin:

    However, state prosecutors have claimed that Mikhail Khodorkovsky's senior partner Leonid Nevzlin was complicit in the murder of the Gorins and ordered Pichugin to kill and intimidate several other people. One of the victims of this violent campaign was Valentina Korneyeva, who owned a business called "The Tea Shop" and was murdered for refusing to sell her space in downtown Moscow to the Yukos-affiliated Menatep Bank. Another victim was Olga Kostina, whom the BBC describes as "a one-time adviser to Mr. Khodorkovsky who went to work for Moscow's city government." Actually, Mrs. Kostina had taken a job working in Moscow Mayor Yuri Luzhkov's office of communications. Nevzlin may have feared that Mrs. Kostina had too much kompromat (dirt) on her former boss.

    Finally, from today's news:

    http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,231898,00.html

    Nevzlin — a former shareholder in the Yukos oil company — told Israel's daily Haaretz newspaper on Friday that Litvinenko had visited him for a meeting.

    He said he had passed on documents related to the campaign of criminal charges and tax claims against Yukos shareholders and officials, including now-jailed founder Mikhail Khodorkovsky. Nevzlin told the newspaper he feared the ex-agent's death could be connected to the probe.

    Nevzlin was charged by Russian prosecutors with organizing murders, fraud and tax evasion, and lives in self-imposed exile in Israel to evade prosecution.

    So who was more dangerous: Litvinenko's friends or his enemies?

Most Active Letters Threads

426

A key British official reminds us of the forgotten anthrax attack

A vast array of establishment and expert sources do not believe this episode was really resolved.
331

The crazy, irrational beliefs of Muslims

Tom Friedman explains the real problem: stupid Muslims think the U.S. is about war and aggression.
210

Is Obama's civil liberties record understandable?

Was it unreasonable to expect him to adhere to his commitments regarding the Constitution?
111

How dare you criticize wasteful defense spending!

So you think it's only terrorist-appeasing lefties who are down on Pentagon profligacy? Think again
59

Police to talk to Woods

Early morning crash raises questions, and revives tabloid speculation

View all »

Letters Help

Currently in Salon