‘Remember Trotsky!’

25 November 2006

Neil Barnett recalls his encounters with the poisoned spy who has had the bearing of a marked man for years. The Russian intelligence services, Litvinenko told him, are purely political organisations, whose only purpose is to shore up Putin’s power

‘Let me tell you story,’ said Bukovsky (like many Russians, he has at best an on-off relationship with articles). ‘A few weeks ago Sasha [Litvinenko] came to lunch in Cambridge. After lunch we went for walk in park. Sasha’s mobile phone rang; it was old colleague from FSB. He said, “Sasha, you think you’re safe in London, and perhaps you are. But remember what happened to Trotsky!”’ Bukovsky found his story so amusing that he more or less detonated with mirth. Litvinenko remained unmoved, and studied his trainers more intently.

Of course, things have moved on since 1940, when Stalin’s agent Ramon Mercader drove an ice pick into Trotsky’s head in Mexico City: a dose of radioactive thallium is altogether more in keeping with modern, advanced Russia.

We met again the next year, this time in Piccadilly by the statue of Eros. His English had improved dramatically, and he seemed a little more at ease in London. He was bursting with information about complicated criminal conspiracies involving senior FSB officers and underworld figures from Chechnya and Georgia. He had worked in Urpo, the organised crime bureau of the FSB, but from what he told me it was clear that the bureau had misinterpreted its mission and, rather than combating organised crime, had been indulging in it. He said, ‘The Russian intelligence services are not like yours, they are not concerned principally with national security. They are secret political organisations whose first duty is power, and today that means Putin’s power.’

He drew complicated spider diagrams in his notebook to illustrate the mechanics of various illegal businesses, and he was still pushing the Interpol warrant story. But again nothing he said could be adequately checked and proved, nothing added up to a useable press story.

He did say, however, that Victor Kirov, a man from the Russian embassy in London claiming to be deputy consul, was harassing him by calling unannounced at his house at night. Litvinenko complained to the police who told the Russian embassy that as Litvinenko was a British citizen, they had no right to approach him. But if he started to feel more secure in central London, that was a mistake: it was probably in Piccadilly three weeks ago that he was poisoned.