Probe of Spy's Death Finds Radiation on Two British Jets
Though Risk Called Low, Airline Alerts Recent Passengers

By Kevin Sullivan and Peter Finn
Washington Post Foreign Service
Thursday, November 30, 2006; 9:04 AM

LONDON, Nov. 29 -- British authorities investigating the death of former Russian spy Alexander Litvinenko have discovered low levels of radiation on two British Airways jetliners, prompting the airline to ground the planes and issue warnings to as many as 33,000 passengers who traveled in the past month on those aircraft and on a third plane grounded in Moscow, company officials said Wednesday.

Two other planes -- a Russian aircraft and a Boeing 737 leased by Russian carrier Transaero -- were also being monitored, British Home Secretary John Reid told parliament on Thursday. In addition, Reid said that British authorities have found traces of radioactivity at 12 of 24 locations investigated in the wake of Litvinenko's death.



The risk to public health is still considered low. But, after finding contamination on two Boeing 767 planes, British Airways officials urged passengers to call Britain's National Health Service or their doctors if they have symptoms or want information. Health officials have said the radioactive material that killed Litvinenko, called polonium-210, would have to be ingested or inhaled to be dangerous.

All three affected planes flew on the London-Moscow route, but they also made a total of more than 220 flights that landed in Barcelona; Athens; Stockholm; Vienna; Istanbul; Madrid; Larnaca, Cyprus; and the German cities of Dusseldorf and Frankfurt, airline officials said. The airline posted on its Web site, http://www.britishairways.com, a full list of flights made by the grounded aircraft dating back to Oct. 25.

The radiation found on the planes is an important new clue for investigators who are trying to solve an extraordinary case that has caused political tensions between London and Moscow. It may help determine where the polonium-210 came from as detectives follow the trail of the radioactive substance.

Airline officials said they acted at the request of government officials who are investigating the mysterious death last week of Litvinenko, 43. His family and friends have alleged that he was murdered, but police have said only that his death is "suspicious."

Traces of radiation have also been found at Litvinenko's London home, as well as a central London restaurant, a hotel and two offices that he visited Nov. 1, the day he fell violently ill.

Litvinenko's supporters allege that he was killed on orders from Russian President Vladimir Putin, an assertion that Kremlin officials have labeled nonsense. British Prime Minister Tony Blair on Tuesday called Litvinenko's death "a very serious matter" and said, "We are determined to find out what happened and who is responsible."

It was unclear Wednesday night whether police suspect that polonium-210 was carried into Britain aboard one of the planes or whether they think that people who had been contaminated by it left the country aboard one of them, or both.

Former KGB agent Andrei Lugovoy and two other Russian men who met with Litvinenko at the Millennium Hotel bar in Grosvenor Square on Nov. 1 later returned to Moscow. Police said traces of radiation were found at the hotel bar, which has been closed to the public.

Since the Litvinenko investigation started, more than 1,100 people have called a help line for those worried over possible exposure to the radioactive substance, health officials said. Eight people showing some symptoms were referred for further tests.

The two planes on which radiation had been detected were grounded at Heathrow Airport on Tuesday evening and a third remained on the ground in Moscow awaiting radiation testing, an airline spokeswoman said. A company spokesman said British Airways employees were attempting to reach all of the estimated 33,000 people who traveled on those planes, mainly by telephone and e-mail.

British Airways has also set up special telephone numbers, listed on its Web site, for people to call to determine whether they were on one of the planes in question.

Nancy McKinley of the International Airline Passengers Association in Dallas said the large number of passengers and flights involved over a relatively short time period illustrate the complexity of issues involved with airline security.



"This shows that you can't look at this industry without thinking about the global implications," she said.

In Moscow, officials reported that another prominent Russian had suddenly fallen ill. Former acting prime minister Yegor Gaidar became sick Friday at a conference in Ireland, vomiting and then losing consciousness for three hours, according to his spokesman.

Gaidar's daughter, Maria Gaidar, said that the incident had posed a serious threat to her father's life but that his condition was improving. He was transferred from Dublin to a Moscow hospital on Sunday.

Doctors have not identified the cause of the illness and are considering the possibility that Gaidar, 50, might have been poisoned, his spokesman said. Gaidar became ill in the afternoon.

Gaidar fell ill at a university just outside Dublin where he was answering questions about a new book he had written. He has been a critic of Putin's policies, particularly the increasing of state control over important sectors of the economy.

Valery Natarov, the spokesman for Gaidar, told news agencies here that "nobody has ruled out the poisoning version. It is being considered, and doctors are studying all the symptoms and consequences to cure Yegor and diagnose the causes."

A close colleague of Gaidar's, Anatoly Chubais, a deputy prime minister under Russian President Boris Yeltsin and now the head of the country's state electric company, said that Gaidar was "on the verge of death" Friday and that the symptoms did not appear to be the result of a natural illness.

Russian officials have argued Litvinenko's death stemmed from an overseas plot by disaffected exiles to discredit Putin, not an order issued by the Kremlin.

Gaidar, who served as acting prime minister under Yeltsin from June to December 1992, was one of the architects of the post-Soviet transition to a market economy. He was later reviled by many Russians who blamed him for their impoverishment during a time when favored tycoons enriched themselves from the privatization of state assets.

Finn reported from Moscow. Correspondent Mary Jordan in London contributed to this report.

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