Friend Claims Litvinenko Killed Over Secret Dossier

John Joseph,

Reuters

Murdered Russian spy Alexander Litvinenko was killed because of an eight-page dossier he had compiled on a powerful Russian figure for a British company, a business associate told the BBC on Saturday.

Litvinenko died in London on November 23 after receiving a lethal dose of radioactive polonium 210. On his deathbed, he accused Russian President Vladimir Putin of ordering his killing. The Kremlin has denied involvement.

Ex-spy Yuri Shvets, who is based in the United States, said Litvinenko had been employed by Western companies to provide information on potential Russian clients before they committed to investment deals in the former Soviet Union.

He said Litvinenko was asked by a British company to write reports on five Russians and asked Shvets for help. The British company was not named. Shvets said he had passed Litvinenko the information for the dossier on one individual in September.

The BBC said it had obtained extracts of the dossier, which British detectives also have, from an unnamed source. The BBC said the report contained damaging personal details about a "very highly placed member of Putin's administration."

"Litvinenko obtained the report on September 20," Shvets told the BBC. "Within the next two weeks he gave the report to Andrei Lugovoy. I believe that triggered the entire assassination."

Lugovoy is a former Russian spy who told Reuters on Thursday he had known Litvinenko casually for nearly a decade and had worked closely with him during 2005, meeting him about 10 times.

Shvets said Litvinenko had given the dossier to Lugovoy to show him how reports on Russian companies and individuals should be presented to Western clients.

However, Shvets said he believed Lugovoy was still employed by the Russian secret service the FSB, the successor to the KGB, and had leaked Litvinenko's dossier to the Russian figure.

Shvets said the report had led to the British company pulling out of a deal, losing the Russian figure potential earnings of "dozens of millions of dollars."

LONDON HOTEL

Lugovoy and businessman Dmitry Kovtun met Litvinenko at a central London hotel, soon after he had met Italian KGB expert Mario Scaramella at a sushi bar. Litvinenko felt ill that night and two days later was admitted to hospital.

"Litvinenko told me he met Lugovoy and other Russians and they offered him tea that wasn't made in front of him, said Shvets.

Lugovoy told Reuters in an interview that he met Litvinenko in October and November but he has repeatedly denied having anything to do with his death.

Litvinenko never blamed Lugovoy publicly for his murder before dying in the London hospital. However, Shvets said he had come around to that possibility.

"I asked Litvenenko who did you think did it?" Shvets told the BBC. "He immediately said Scaramella. For three days he stubbornly reiterated it was Scaramella and only on the fourth day did he admit he met Lugovoy and other Russians.

"I stopped communicating with Litvinenko when it was diagnosed he had been poisoned. But I spoke to his wife and she told me Litvinenko shared my opinion," Shvets told the BBC.

The BBC said senior Scotland Yard officers had interviewed Shvets.

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My So-Called Second Life

[q url="http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,1570708,00.html"]I thought I'd want to have lots of sex. Meaningless, multipartnered, degrading sex. After all, if Second Life is a virtual community in which you can look however you want, do whatever you want and use the fake name you want, then I could make all my fantasies come true. And as I quickly learned, having sex is exactly what many of the people on the site spend their time doing. Occasionally, it seemed, with characters that look like giant fluffy squirrels—which is wonderful, because there is nothing like the warm flush of superiority you feel when discovering a fetish you don't have.

It is not entirely surprising that Second Life is a booming enterprise. There were more than 800,000 people in the past 60 days who spent time chatting in cartoon locations that were built not by the company but by enterprising users.

The growth of Second Life is particularly impressive considering that the program takes forever to download, requires a computer with a graphics card for gaming, sucks up hours just to design your character and—this is the genius part—has created the perfect capitalist system in which you pay for fake stuff (clothing, housing, hookers) with real money. People make thousands of U.S. dollars selling designs for cars or flipping virtual property. Many companies, seeing an opportunity for marketing and sales, have created virtual branches on Second Life: American Apparel has a clothing store, Adidas hawks shoes, Starwood previewed a new line of hotels, Reuters has an embedded journalist, Jay-Z played a concert and the Sundance Channel is setting up a virtual screening room. Apparently, people want to cram their second lives full of the same stuff they have in their first.

But Second Life is different enough (flying! teleporting! cloning!) that it functions as a therapist's couch on which you learn about yourself by safely exploring your darkest desires. Mine, I was shocked to find, do not involve sex. In fact, in my ultimate fantasy life, I do not have a penis. And since genitalia do not come without charge in Second Life, I could free myself from the gnawing distraction of a sex drive. Which meant that for the first time, I would be able to focus all my energy on a quest for power. I planned to put the Reuters guy out of business, own some kind of island where drone armies did my bidding and force people to follow laws based on my insane whims. Unfortunately, the other thing I learned about myself on Second Life, after spending half an hour learning how to walk, was that I'm too lazy to do any of those things. Or even draw my hair and eyebrows right.

After practicing walking at the Welcome Area until I could at least stumble at the level of a Malibu Mel Gibson, I was approached by Cristal Beese, who often looks for new people to help. Cristal clearly needed to upgrade her idea of a fantasy life.

After giving me a tuxedo, Cristal changed into a gown and a blond updo and teleported us to a ballroom, where we clicked on a button to dance salsa. All these graphics were impressive, but they really serve—like the stuff at any decent bar—as an excuse to talk about something. Once we typed to each other about how cool the dancing was, I learned a lot about Cristal's real life: her husband, her Peruvian background, her recent move to Holland. She called me "hun" a lot and lol-ed at all my jokes. She seemed so smart and interesting, I felt pretty sure she was a 25-year-old guy living in his parents' basement.

We also talked about sex a lot. Having sex in Second Life just requires selecting a series of buttons, but it's the instant messaging where the action is. This can get so serious that some people have virtual boyfriends they reserve their virtual sex for—which seems tender until you realize they are doing this in virtual sex clubs. And on the computer.

While we were walking around the ballroom, I learned that Second Life is aggressively heterosexual. Male avatars would not talk to me for more than a sentence or two. In fact, when I tried to talk to a dude who looked just like the Predator, he wouldn't even say hello. This may be because I opened with "Dude, congratulations. You're the biggest dork in Second Life."

I spent the next 41?2 hours with Cristal as she took me to a waterfall, a snowy Christmas scene, a shipwreck and a sex club. At some point, she offered me a free penis. Much as I didn't want to take it, it's damned hard to tell even a fake woman that you don't want the free penis she's giving you. So I thanked her. And I realized how incredibly nice she was and how—even in Second Life, where anything is possible—I wasn't really any different than I ever am.

Four days later, I went back to Second Life and found Cristal. After embarrassingly having to remind her who I was, she gave me her real name, Marita, and her Web address. It turns out, Marita is not only a woman but an awfully pretty one, who seemed to have a full life, just as she did on Second Life. It would have been a lot more exciting to know before we fake made out. But, I asked myself, would that have ruined the purity of our bodiless relationship? And also, should I have dropped $5 for a really sweet penis? From the Dec. 25, 2006 issue of TIME magazine

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Magnets to Blame in Death, Injuries

[q url="http://health.aol.com/news/story/_a/magnets-to-blame-in-death-injuries/20061208170909990003"]At least one U.S. child has died and 19 others have needed surgery since 2003 after swallowing magnets used in toys, the government reported Thursday.

Most of those cases were believed to involve tiny but strong "rare earth" magnets that can link together in children's digestive tracts, squeezing and even perforating the intestines, the researchers said.

The magnets, made from neodymium iron boron or other compounds, have become common in the U.S. toy market in the past five years because they have become cheaper to produce, said Jonathan Midgett, the study's lead author and an engineering psychologist with the U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission.

They are used in building sets, action figures and dolls.

"Most people who have never had them in their hands are shocked at how strong these tiny things are," Midgett said.

Kenny Sweet, a 20-month-old boy from Redmond, Wash., died two days after he began complaining of stomach aches and vomiting. An autopsy found nine small magnets stacked together. They had caused a twisting of the bowel and a blood infection.

The magnets had come off a building set belonging to Kenny's 10-year-old brother, according to his family's lawyers. Mega Brands Inc. recalled 3.8 million Magnetix building sets, added warning labels and agreed to pay $13.5 million to settle lawsuits.

Last month, Mattel Inc. recalled more than 4 million Polly Pocket play sets, dolls with small magnets in their hands, feet, clothing and other accessories.

Last month, the U.S. Public Interest Research Group for the first time included the magnets on its annual holiday warning about dangerous toys.

Midgett said federal and industry officials hope to have a warning label ready within six months for toys containing magnets.

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Today in history - Dec. 16

The Associated Press

Today is Saturday, Dec. 16, the 350th day of 2006. There are 15 days left in the year.

Today's Highlight in History:

On Dec. 16, 1773, the Boston Tea Party took place as American colonists boarded a British ship and dumped more than 300 chests of tea overboard to protest tea taxes.

On this date:

In 1653, Oliver Cromwell became lord protector of England, Scotland and Ireland.

In 1770, composer Ludwig van Beethoven was born in Bonn, Germany.

In 1905, the entertainment trade publication Variety came out with its first weekly issue.

In 1944, the World War II Battle of the Bulge began as German forces launched a surprise counterattack against Allied forces in Belgium.

In 1950, President Truman proclaimed a national state of emergency in order to fight "Communist imperialism."

In 1956, Cardinal Francis Spellman, the Archbishop of New York, personally denounced the yet-to-be released movie "Baby Doll," saying Catholics would be committing a sin if they saw it.

In 1960, 134 people were killed when a United Air Lines DC-8 and a TWA Super Constellation collided over New York City.

In 1986, Ronald W. Pelton, a former National Security Agency employee convicted of selling defense secrets to the Soviet Union, was sentenced by a judge in Baltimore to life in prison.

In 1991, the U.N. General Assembly rescinded its 1975 resolution equating Zionism with racism by a vote of 111-25.

In 2000, President-elect Bush selected Colin Powell to become the first black secretary of state.

Ten years ago: Underscoring the importance of parents' rights to their children, the Supreme Court said that states must let parents appeal orders terminating such rights even when they cannot afford court fees. Former South Korean President Chun Doo-hwan, condemned to death for a 1979 coup and a deadly military crackdown, had his sentence commuted to life imprisonment.

Five years ago: After nine weeks of fighting, Afghan militia leaders claimed control of the last mountain bastion of Osama bin Laden's al-Qaida fighters, but bin Laden himself was nowhere to be seen. The first U.S. commercial food shipments since 1963 arrived in communist Cuba. Cleveland Browns fans threw thousands of bottles onto the field after officials overturned a last-minute call, a decision that helped the Jacksonville Jaguars win the game 15-10.

One year ago: In a stinging defeat for President Bush, Senate Democrats blocked passage of a new Patriot Act to combat terrorism at home. (The result was a revised Patriot Act signed by Bush in March 2006.) Actor John Spencer, who'd played the powerful chief of staff on TV's "The West Wing," died in Los Angeles at age 58. Singer-actor Enzo Stuarti died in Midland, Texas, at age 86. Jessica Simpson filed for divorce from Nick Lachey.

Today's Birthdays: Author Sir Arthur C. Clarke is 89. Civil rights attorney Morris Dees is 70. Actress Joyce Bulifant is 69. Actress Liv Ullmann is 68. CBS news correspondent Lesley Stahl is 65. TV producer Steven Bochco is 63. Pop singer Benny Andersson (ABBA) is 60. Actor Ben Cross is 59. Rock singer-musician Billy Gibbons (ZZ Top) is 57. Rock musician Bill Bateman (The Blasters) is 55. Actress Alison LaPlaca is 47. Actor Sam Robards is 45. Actor Jon Tenney is 45. Actor Benjamin Bratt is 43. Country singer-songwriter Jeff Carson is 43. Rhythm-and-blues singer Michael McCary is 35. Country musician Chris Scruggs is 24. Actress Hallee Hirsh is 19.

Thought for Today: "There is no king who has not had a slave among his ancestors, and no slave who has not had a king among his." — Helen Keller, American author and lecturer (1880-1968).

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