Moscow - State Duma member Andrei Lugovoi has said he ready to give explanations to the British justice system in relation to the death of former Russian FSB (Federal Security Service) agent Alexander Litvinenko.
"My lawyers demanded at the session of a forensic medical expert on October 13 to provide me with an opportunity, if need be, to give explanations over Litvinenko’s death," Lugovoi told Interfax on Sunday.
No one has formally informed me about this session of a forensic medical expert, he said.
"My lawyers have learnt about it by accident and made a statement there," Lugovoi said.
Litvinenko’s representatives were also present at the session, he said.
"I told my lawyers that I am ready to give explanations, if need be, including via video link. Contrary to some media reports, there was no talk about my consent to an interrogation," Lugovoi said.
As for the reports that Litvinenko’s widow admitted that her late husband cooperated with the British intelligence services and was well paid for it, Lugovoi said: "This is not new for me. Now let the British secret services give clear explanations what assignments Litvinenko had performed for them."
Preliminary hearings in the Litvinenko inquest began in London on October 13. The court ordered that the hearings be held closed to the public and the media.
Former Russian agent A. Litvinenko died in hospital in London in the early hours of November 24, 2006, as a result of being poisoned with radioactive polonium 210. Prosecutors in the United Kingdom accused Lugovoi of the murder.
Lugovoi, as well as businessmen Dmitry Kovtun and Vyacheslav Sokolenko, who were in London in October-November 2006, met with Litvinenko three weeks before his death. The UK authorities demanded Lugovoi’s extradition from Russia, but were denied because under its Constitution, Russia does not extradite its citizens to a foreign state. Lugovoi himself has maintained his innocence.
In December 2006, the Russian Prosecutor General’s Office launched its own criminal inquiry into Litvinenko death, as well as an attempted murder of businessman Kovtun.
