London Telegraph
Tuesday, November 21, 2006

The Russian president, Vladimir Putin, could order the assassination of all his exiled opponents in Britain, including me, unless Tony Blair and George W Bush end their appeasement of his authoritarian regime.

I have no doubt that the man who tried to kill my friend Alexander Litvinenko is back in Moscow and will walk free in its streets for as long as the current regime, which is dominated by ex-members of the KGB, controls the Kremlin.

Alexander was a high-profile critic of Moscow who often spoke in strong language of the state's abuses of power. His most recent investigations were driven by his belief that Mr Putin had ordered the execution of Anna Politkovskaya, the journalist who was shot in the doorway of her apartment building last month.

advertisementThe attempt to kill Alexander, who had only last month been granted British citizenship, could not have been carried out without the express approval of the president.

London is known around the world as a friendly haven for many Russians — not all of them billionaires as the media coverage often implies — who believe that the country needs a viable opposition and the restraints of democratic politics.

As Alexander clings to life in the intensive care ward at University College Hospital, every Russian who expresses any criticism of the government of our homeland knows that distance offers little protection from the vengeful Russian state.

When I spoke to Marina, Alexander's wife, she was convinced that the assassination attempt was carried out by a man I shall not name but his identity is widely known in Russian business circles.

This man was for a time a close associate of Boris Berezovsky, the billionaire businessman driven out by Mr Putin who now lives in exile in Surrey. After a spell in prison, the former subordinate emerged as a KGB agent and became very rich.

By arranging a meeting with Alexander and administering a dose of the deadly poison thallium, he has repaid his debt to the state. He is now safely back in Russia and is thus safe from any attempt to hold him accountable for his actions.

Since the fall of the Soviet Union, the KGB, my old employer, has been renamed the FSB. But I know its methods are unchanged from those perfected in the darkest hours of Stalin's reign of terror. President Putin is, like myself, a former KGB operative in Western Europe.

As such, he is fully aware of the potential hostile reaction of British public opinion to reports that Russia tried to murder a dissident in London. But President Putin is unlikely to lie awake at night worrying about the negative publicity the attack on Alexander has generated.

He knows that the west has failed to call his government to account for the suspicious circumstances surrounding Ms Politkovskaya's murder. Indeed on the day she died, President Bush trumpeted Russia's acceptance into the World Trade Organisation.

Yet Mr Putin is eliminating his opponents with the same ruthless determination displayed by Adolf Hitler in the 1930s. Western leaders are pursuing a hypocritical policy of appeasement that is encouraging the ruthless instincts of Russia's leaders.

I refused to allow a Russian television crew to come to my home yesterday to interview me. The Russian journalists who have visited me over the last 15 years are all swindlers and spies.

I know that today the KGB has tried to kill my friend. Tomorrow it could be me and the day after it could be another London-based critic of Mr Putin's government.

The British government must view this episode as provocation and use the opportunity to stand up to Mr Putin. It must recognise that all the worst aspects of contemporary Russia are spreading unchecked in this country. Steps must be taken to protect us, the Russian exiles, and the population of Britain as a whole from the dictator in the Kremlin.

• Oleg Gordievsky was a KGB colonel and its London station chief. In 1985 he became the highest-ranking spy to defect to the West.