Litvinenko Suspect Running for Office
This article is from the archive of The New York Sun before the launch of its new website in 2022. The Sun has neither altered nor updated such articles but will seek to correct any errors, mis-categorizations or other problems introduced during transfer.

MOSCOW – The sole suspect in the radiation poisoning death of a former KGB agent announced plans to run for parliament today on the ticket of a pro-Kremlin ultranationalist party.
Andrei Lugovoi, another former KGB officer who met with Alexander Litvinenko at a London hotel bar on Nov. 1 hours before Litvinenko fell ill, told state-run Russia Today television that he had no desire to go into politics but changed his mind because of British accusations.
Now a Moscow businessman who runs a private security agency, Mr. Lugovoi said today that he would be No. 2 on the list of Vladimir Zhirinovsky’s Liberal Democratic Party in December’s parliamentary elections.
Litvinenko, who became a vocal Kremlin critic and sought asylum in Britain, died November 23 in a London hospital after ingesting radioactive polonium-210. On his deathbed, he accused Russian President Putin of being behind his poisoning — charges the Kremlin has fiercely denied.
Britain has identified Mr. Lugovoi as the main suspect in the death and and demanded his extradition. Russia has rejected the demand, saying its constitution forbids it, and Mr. Putin has called the demands a vestige of British “colonial thinking.”
Mr. Lugovoi has dismissed the accusations and accused British authorities of hurting his business interests.
“I was a businessman, but no longer, thanks to the disgusting policy of British prosecutors which led to this political hysteria,” Mr. Lugovoi told Russia Today. “With the situation being highly politicized by British opponents, I find myself in the midst of a political wave of interest in me.”
Mr. Zhirinovsky, a flamboyant politician who heeds the Kremlin’s orders, said his party congress would confirm Mr. Lugovoi’s position on the party list tomorrow. He dismissed British charges against Mr. Lugovoi as “an attempt to organize provocations against our citizens,” the Interfax news agency reported.
Tensions over the Litvinenko case have badly hurt the bilateral ties, and the two nations recently have announced tit-for tat diplomat expulsions.