I am sure that Mr Lugovoi and Mr Kovtun placed the polonium-210 in the teapot of the Pine Bar on 1 November 2006. I am also sure that they did this with the intention of poisoning Mr Litvinenko.
I am sure that the two men had made an earlier attempt to poison Mr Litvinenko, also using polonium-210, at the Erinys meeting on 16 October 2006.
I am sure that Mr Lugovoi and Mr Kovtun knew that they were using a deadly poison (as opposed, for example, to a truth drug or sleeping draught), and that they intended to kill Mr Litvinenko. I do not believe, however, that they knew precisely what the chemical that they were handling was, or the nature of all of its properties.
I am sure that Mr Lugovoi and Mr Kovtun were acting on behalf of others when they poisoned Mr Litvinenko.
And:
When Mr Lugovoi poisoned Mr Litvinenko, it is probable that he did so under the direction of the FSB. I would add that I regard that as a strong probability. I have found that Mr Kovtun also took part in the poisoning. I conclude therefore that he was also acting under FSB direction, possibly indirectly through Mr Lugovoi but probably to his knowledge.
Then:
The FSB operation to kill Mr Litvinenko was probably approved by Mr Patrushev and also by President Putin.
Owen had gone further than anyone predicted. Though with a degree of caution, he had ruled that Russia’s president was, in effect, a murderer who wiped out his personal enemies in spectacularly vindictive fashion. It was an unprecedented conclusion.
And one that raised a host of further questions. How had the judge arrived at this? What should the UK government do by way of response? And how should other world leaders behave the next time that Putin popped up among them? Could Barack and David really shake Vladimir warmly by the hand?
As Owen made clear, he had relied on two types of evidence. One was the public stuff laid out in open hearings during January, February, March and July 2015. This material alone, he wrote, established ‘a strong circumstantial case that the Russian state was responsible for Mr Litvinenko’s death’.
The judge’s reasoning was set down in numbered paragraphs. He noted that the two Russian killers had ‘no personal animus against Mr Litvinenko’. There was a ‘possible relationship between Mr Lugovoi (who was clearly the leader of the two men) and the FSB in the years leading up to and including 2006’. Polonium was made in a nuclear reactor. Its use for the hit suggested the pair were ‘acting for a state body’ rather than, say, mafia interests.
On the logistics chain inside Russia, Owen noted: ‘Although it cannot be said that the polonium with which Mr Litvinenko was poisoned must have come from the Avangard facility in Russia, it certainly could have come from there.’
There were, he added, ‘powerful motives’ for individuals and organisation inside Russia to take action against Litvinenko, ‘including killing him’. They included – from the agency’s point of view – his betrayal of the FSB. Additionally, there was his work for British intelligence, his association with leading opponents of the Putin regime, his possible attempt to recruit Lugovoi for MI6, and his ‘highly personal public criticism’ of the president.
Owen was further persuaded by contextual evidence. It said that prior to Litvinenko’s death the Russian state ‘had been involved in the killing of a number of opponents of President Putin’s administration’. The chairman observed: ‘The pattern was of killings both inside and outside Russia. There was evidence of poisons, including radioactive poisons, being used in some cases.’
Then there was Putin’s strange behaviour in the aftermath of the murder. Putin had ‘supported and protected’ Lugovoi, and latterly handed him an honour for ‘services to the fatherland’. ‘Whilst it does not follow that Mr Lugovoi must have been acting on behalf of the Russian State when he killed Mr Litvinenko, the way in which President Putin has treated Mr Lugovoi is certainly consistent with that hypothesis,’ Owen found. ‘Moreover, President Putin’s conduct towards Mr Lugovoi suggests a level of approval for the killing of Mr Litvinenko.’
So far, so commonsensical. But the judge signposted that he had relied heavily in his conclusions on material presented in closed sessions – ‘all the evidence and analysis available to me’, as he put it. He had conducted what he termed a ‘global analysis’. The most intriguing section of his report was part seven. It wasn’t very long, just two pages. It dealt with material covered by restriction notices issued by the home secretary.
So just how much evidence had MI6 and GCHQ presented to Sir Robert? As it turned out, rather a lot: ‘There is a considerable quantity of closed documentary evidence in this case. I have also received a number of closed witness statements, some of which are lengthy,’ he admitted.
The details of these closed sessions had previously been fuzzy. Now, Sir Robert revealed, he’d held secret hearings ‘over several days’ in May 2015. They had taken place ‘in a government building in London’. MI6’s HQ overlooking the Thames? The Home Office? This was the private part of the public inquiry. Those present had included only Sir Robert, the counsel and solicitor to the inquiry, and home secretary Theresa May’s legal team. Plus, of course, ‘a number of witnesses’ who were called to give evidence.
It’s unclear who these anonymous witnesses were. But it’s a fair guess they might have included ‘Martin’, Litvinenko’s Russian-speaking MI6 contact. And ‘Jorge’, who performed the same role in Madrid. Senior figures from MI6 may have testified too. Almost certainly there was electronic intercept evidence: the report allows the inference that chatter might have been picked up between Lugovoi and his FSB bosses. Did this come from British spooks at GCHQ? Or from Washington via the NSA, the world’s most potent government eavesdropping organisation?
The judge, then, had produced two versions of his report: a public version, and a closed version for a small official readership. Only those in government who had signed the Official Secrets Act got appendix twelve. This featured transcripts of the secret sessions, closed documents and witness statements. The restricted version dealt with two key themes: the nature and extent of Litvinenko’s relationship with the UK’s security and intelligence agencies; and the question of whether the Russian state murdered him.
Owen’s closed findings remain unreleased. They include one ‘recommendation’, under the terms of the UK’s 2005 Inquiries Act, so far mysterious. What is clear, however, is that this secret material played a crucial role in convincing the judge that Putin ‘probably approved’ Litvinenko’s exotic, near bungled execution. Like an invisible springboard, it vaulted his understanding of what had gone on in the febrile months of October and November 2006 to another level.
Marina Litvinenko had seen the report twenty-four hours earlier. She and Anatoly, plus their legal team, paged through it in a secure room, on condition that they said nothing about its contents. At 9.35 a.m., the embargo was lifted. The excited journalists locked in at Gray’s Inn promptly shared the findings around the world. I did the same, before running over to the next venue of interest, the High Court.
Events were moving at pace. At 10 a.m., Owen was due to read a short televised statement.
I arrived at Court 73. The public gallery was full. Some there knew that Owen was about to deliver his bombshell; others didn’t. I spotted DI Craig Mascall and other Scotland Yard coppers. They were grinning. Litvinenko’s surviving friends had come along: Zakayev, with his wife and wearing an astrakhan hat; Goldfarb; Dubov. Oxford historian Robert Service had dropped in. Owen, he would soon discover, had praised his ‘impressive’ expert evidence.
There were London-based Russian dissidents, and a reporter from Novaya Gazeta, who’d flown in from Moscow. There was a buzz of voices, speaking Russian and English. Marina Litvinenko and Anatoly sat at the front. She looked radiant; her son, understandably, somewhat wiped out and dazed.