http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/uk/article3362061.ece
February 13, 2008
Death of billionaire Georgian leader in London 'is suspicious'
Tony Halpin in Moscow
An exiled Georgian billionaire who claimed less than two months ago that he was the target of an assassination plot has been found dead in London.
Police said that they were treating the death of Badri Patarkatsishvili, 52, as "suspicious". The businessman, who was Georgia's richest man and a close friend of the anti-Kremlin oligarch Boris Berezovsky, died of an apparent heart attack at his £10 million mansion in Leatherhead, Surrey, last night.
"As with all unexpected deaths it is being treated as suspicious. A post-mortem examination will be held later today to establish the cause of death," a Surrey police spokeswoman said.
Mr Patarkatsishvili, worth an estimated £6 billion, funded an opposition campaign against Georgia's pro-western leader Mikheil Saakashvili and stood against him in last month's presidential election. Georgia accused him of plotting a coup after airing a tape of him offering a $100 million bribe to a police chief to support opposition demonstrators.
Mr Patarkatsishvili hired Lord Goldsmith, the former Attorney General, to represent him as Georgian authorities mounted investigations into his business interests in the former Soviet republic.
Mr Berezovsky said that his former business partner had complained about his heart when the pair met earlier on Tuesday, but had not been ill.
Mr Patarkatsishvili lived in Russia between 1993 and 2001. He was wanted by Russian authorities on charges of theft from the country's largest car factory AvtoVAZ in the 1990s, which he ran with Mr Berezovsky.
He was also accused of plotting to arrange the escape from custody in 2001 of Nikolai Glushkov, deputy director of Aeroflot, Russia's national airline, who had been accused of fraud.
The man charged with breaking out Mr Glushkov was Andrei Lugovoy, who was arrested and jailed after the attempt failed. Mr Lugovoy is wanted by the British Crown Prosecution Service for the murder of Alexander Litvinenko, the dissident former Russian spy poisoned in London with radioactive polonium-210 in 2006.
Mr Lugovoy was responsible for protecting Mr Patarkatsishvili and Mr Berezovsky at the time as head of security at the Russian TV channel ORT, which the two men controlled.
Mr Patarkatsishvili remained good friends with Mr Lugovoy, a former KGB officer who is now a member of Russia's Parliament. The pair were seen socialising together in the Georgian capital Tbilisi shortly before Mr Litvinenko was poisoned.
Mr Litvinenko also had links with the Georgian businessman. Sources in Tbilisi have told The Times that he stayed at Mr Patarkatshvili's residence in Georgia en route to Turkey when he fled Russia to seek asylum in London in 2000.
Russian prosecutors claim that Mr Litvinenko also visited Mr Patarkatsishvili as well as Mr Berezovsky in London shortly before he was poisoned. They accuse Mr Berezovsky of involvement in the murder of the former Federal Security Service (FSB) agent as part of a plot to damage President Putin's international image.
Georgia's former Defence Minister, Irakli Okruashvili, accused Mr Saakashvili of encouraging him to kill Mr Patarkatsishvili in 2005, although he later retracted the claim.
The tycoon helped to finance the “Rose Revolution” that swept Mr Saakashvili to power in Georgia in 2003. But the two men later fell out and he accused the president of turning into a dictator.
When Georgian police used tear gas and rubber bullets to disperse opposition street protests in November, special forces troops also stormed the studios of Imedi TV and forced it to shut down. Mr Patarkatsishvili founded the station and News Corporation, which also owns The Times, was managing it at the time of the incident.
Showing posts with label Alexander Litvinenko. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Alexander Litvinenko. Show all posts
Thursday, February 21, 2008
Saturday, September 1, 2007
Russia suggests Berezovsky was behind killing
http://news.independent.co.uk/europe/article2901005.ece
Russia suggests Berezovsky was behind journalist's killing
By Shaun Walker in Moscow
Published: 28 August 2007
Russian prosecutors have announced a breakthrough in the hunt for the killers of Anna Politkovskaya, the crusading journalist and prominent critic of Vladimir Putin, who was murdered last year.
Conveniently for the Kremlin, the finger of suspicion points directly at President Vladimir Putin's main enemy, the exiled Russian tycoon Boris Berezovsky.
The announcement came three days before what would have been Politkovskaya's 49th birthday, and almost a year after she was shot dead in a hail of bullets in the lift of her Moscow apartment building early last October.
The Russian prosecutor-general, Yuri Chaika, said at a press conference in Moscow yesterday that 10 arrests had been made, including the direct organisers, accomplices and the assassin himself.
Figures within the Russian Interior Ministry and secret services have been arrested as accomplices to the crime, but it was hinted that the mastermind of the murder was the oligarch living outside Russia.
The person who ordered the crime, said Mr Chaika, was living outside Russia and wanted to "destabilise the situation in the country ... and return to the previous ruling system, when money and oligarchs decided everything."
This would suggest either the London-based Boris Berezovsky, or the former head of Yukos oil and gas company, Leonid Nevzlin, who lives in Israel. The Kremlin and Russian authorities have long suggested that Mr Berezovsky is behind the murder of both Politkovskaya and Alexander Litvinenko, the former KGB agent poisoned in London last November.
Experts and former colleagues of the assassinated journalist expressed satisfaction that arrests had been made, but scepticism at Mr Chaika's conclusions.
"It's good that there has been progress in the case," said Igor Yakovenko, secretary-general of the Russian Union of Journalists. "If we believe everything that Chaika says then this is the end of the sad tradition of the murders of journalists in Russia going unsolved." But, he said, there were several doubts about the allegations. "It's worrying that, even before the investigation has been officially completed, they are pointing the finger at people abroad," he said.
Dmitry Muratov, the editor of Novaya Gazeta, the opposition newspaper where Politkovskaya published her hard-hitting reports on Russian politics and the conflict in Chechnya, expressed similar doubts. "We have known about this for a while. We've worked together with their investigation and we trust their professionalism," said Mr Muratov. "But we are absolutely amazed that they have openly stated they know who ordered the crime before the investigation has even been completed."
Mr Muratov confirmed that a security services official had been arrested, and revealed that the FSB security-service operative in question was a Moscow-based lieutenant-colonel. "At this stage, I don't want to reveal any more," he said. "Let's wait first for the court case."
Mr Chaika stated that the killing was carried out by a Chechen criminal gang operating in Moscow that specialises in professional hits. He also linked the group to the killings of Andrei Kozlov, the corruption-fighting banker who was shot dead last year, and the Forbes magazine editor Paul Klebnikov, killed in 2004.
He refused to name the mastermind, but separately stated that Russia's long-standing efforts to have Boris Berezovsky brought before a Russian court could bear fruit soon, if the former oligarch is extradited from Britain to Brazil, where he is wanted on charges of financial irregularity, and from there to Russia.
If all of Mr Chaika's claims are to be believed, it would mean that members of Russia's security services are under the command of Boris Berezovsky. " The level of corruption in Russia can bring many unpleasant surprises," said Gennady Gudkov, a former FSB colonel and now a member of the security committee of the Duma, or parliament. Mr Gudkov said he was certain the London-based exile was behind the killing: "My information leads me to believe that Berezovsky himself, or people controlled by him, are behind both this act and many acts of terrorism."
Others were sceptical. "We have no guarantees the names of those who really ordered the killing and the names of those who will be accused of it will be the same," said a statement from Novaya Gazeta's editorial team. "We have no complaints about the investigative team. We're working together ... But we want to be certain that nothing 'expedient', with no actual relation to the crime, influences this joint work."
Many might wonder if it is a little too convenient that Mr Chaika's statement neatly confirms the Kremlin's allegations from the start. "It makes you wonder if we are dealing not only with an 'ordered' killing but with an 'ordered' investigation too," said Mr Yakovenko.
Mr Berezovsky did not comment last night.
A passionate critic of Putin
* Born in New York in 1958 to Soviet Ukrainian parents - both UN diplomats - Anna Politkovskaya graduated as a journalist from Moscow State university and went on to report for the Soviet newspaper Izvestiya for over 10 years. In 1999, she became a national figure when she joined the relatively liberal Novaya Gazeta, a paper which took a consistently critical line against the Kremlin.
* She travelled regularly to Chechnya and the north Caucasus, reporting especially on the deaths of innocent civilians caught up in the war there with Russia.
* In 2002, she tried to help negotiate at the scene after becoming one of the few journalists to enter the theatre in Moscow seized by Chechen militants who held hundreds of people hostage.
* In 2004, she reported that she had been poisoned by a cup of tea on a flight.
* In the same year, she wrote Putin's Russia: Life in a Failing Democracy, a book attacking Mr Putin's human rights record. Her final article was about pro-Kremlin militias operating a policy of "Chechenisation" in the region. She was shot dead in her Moscow apartment block on 7 October 2006.
Russia suggests Berezovsky was behind journalist's killing
By Shaun Walker in Moscow
Published: 28 August 2007
Russian prosecutors have announced a breakthrough in the hunt for the killers of Anna Politkovskaya, the crusading journalist and prominent critic of Vladimir Putin, who was murdered last year.
Conveniently for the Kremlin, the finger of suspicion points directly at President Vladimir Putin's main enemy, the exiled Russian tycoon Boris Berezovsky.
The announcement came three days before what would have been Politkovskaya's 49th birthday, and almost a year after she was shot dead in a hail of bullets in the lift of her Moscow apartment building early last October.
The Russian prosecutor-general, Yuri Chaika, said at a press conference in Moscow yesterday that 10 arrests had been made, including the direct organisers, accomplices and the assassin himself.
Figures within the Russian Interior Ministry and secret services have been arrested as accomplices to the crime, but it was hinted that the mastermind of the murder was the oligarch living outside Russia.
The person who ordered the crime, said Mr Chaika, was living outside Russia and wanted to "destabilise the situation in the country ... and return to the previous ruling system, when money and oligarchs decided everything."
This would suggest either the London-based Boris Berezovsky, or the former head of Yukos oil and gas company, Leonid Nevzlin, who lives in Israel. The Kremlin and Russian authorities have long suggested that Mr Berezovsky is behind the murder of both Politkovskaya and Alexander Litvinenko, the former KGB agent poisoned in London last November.
Experts and former colleagues of the assassinated journalist expressed satisfaction that arrests had been made, but scepticism at Mr Chaika's conclusions.
"It's good that there has been progress in the case," said Igor Yakovenko, secretary-general of the Russian Union of Journalists. "If we believe everything that Chaika says then this is the end of the sad tradition of the murders of journalists in Russia going unsolved." But, he said, there were several doubts about the allegations. "It's worrying that, even before the investigation has been officially completed, they are pointing the finger at people abroad," he said.
Dmitry Muratov, the editor of Novaya Gazeta, the opposition newspaper where Politkovskaya published her hard-hitting reports on Russian politics and the conflict in Chechnya, expressed similar doubts. "We have known about this for a while. We've worked together with their investigation and we trust their professionalism," said Mr Muratov. "But we are absolutely amazed that they have openly stated they know who ordered the crime before the investigation has even been completed."
Mr Muratov confirmed that a security services official had been arrested, and revealed that the FSB security-service operative in question was a Moscow-based lieutenant-colonel. "At this stage, I don't want to reveal any more," he said. "Let's wait first for the court case."
Mr Chaika stated that the killing was carried out by a Chechen criminal gang operating in Moscow that specialises in professional hits. He also linked the group to the killings of Andrei Kozlov, the corruption-fighting banker who was shot dead last year, and the Forbes magazine editor Paul Klebnikov, killed in 2004.
He refused to name the mastermind, but separately stated that Russia's long-standing efforts to have Boris Berezovsky brought before a Russian court could bear fruit soon, if the former oligarch is extradited from Britain to Brazil, where he is wanted on charges of financial irregularity, and from there to Russia.
If all of Mr Chaika's claims are to be believed, it would mean that members of Russia's security services are under the command of Boris Berezovsky. " The level of corruption in Russia can bring many unpleasant surprises," said Gennady Gudkov, a former FSB colonel and now a member of the security committee of the Duma, or parliament. Mr Gudkov said he was certain the London-based exile was behind the killing: "My information leads me to believe that Berezovsky himself, or people controlled by him, are behind both this act and many acts of terrorism."
Others were sceptical. "We have no guarantees the names of those who really ordered the killing and the names of those who will be accused of it will be the same," said a statement from Novaya Gazeta's editorial team. "We have no complaints about the investigative team. We're working together ... But we want to be certain that nothing 'expedient', with no actual relation to the crime, influences this joint work."
Many might wonder if it is a little too convenient that Mr Chaika's statement neatly confirms the Kremlin's allegations from the start. "It makes you wonder if we are dealing not only with an 'ordered' killing but with an 'ordered' investigation too," said Mr Yakovenko.
Mr Berezovsky did not comment last night.
A passionate critic of Putin
* Born in New York in 1958 to Soviet Ukrainian parents - both UN diplomats - Anna Politkovskaya graduated as a journalist from Moscow State university and went on to report for the Soviet newspaper Izvestiya for over 10 years. In 1999, she became a national figure when she joined the relatively liberal Novaya Gazeta, a paper which took a consistently critical line against the Kremlin.
* She travelled regularly to Chechnya and the north Caucasus, reporting especially on the deaths of innocent civilians caught up in the war there with Russia.
* In 2002, she tried to help negotiate at the scene after becoming one of the few journalists to enter the theatre in Moscow seized by Chechen militants who held hundreds of people hostage.
* In 2004, she reported that she had been poisoned by a cup of tea on a flight.
* In the same year, she wrote Putin's Russia: Life in a Failing Democracy, a book attacking Mr Putin's human rights record. Her final article was about pro-Kremlin militias operating a policy of "Chechenisation" in the region. She was shot dead in her Moscow apartment block on 7 October 2006.
Saturday, July 21, 2007
Whaddup, Steamshovel?
Whaddup, Steamshovel?
by Kenn Thomas
SteamshovelPress.com
Good news! The new Steamshovel-related book, Conspiracy Files, is now available in Australia. The publishers plan US and UK editions some time in the near future, but anxious readers who want to check it out right way, go to www.murdochbooks.com.au/conspiracy.htm and have it shipped.
The book has a slick, color, nice interior graphics, hardback design.
It presents a gamut of historical conspiracy information useful to the novice and at the same time a wealth of arcane detail that will satisfy even veteran conspiracy watchers that they came away learning something new. Kinda like an issue of Steamshovel.
That leads to the bad news. As many readers have noticed, the Steamshovel has stalled for some time now. It has no advertising revenue streams and the subscription money it brings in has been barely enough over the years to get its motor to turn over.
For many months it has survived only on the well wishes of its considerable and devoted audience. Alas, with the last round of postal and printer increases, even that no longer makes it possible to continue to produce the hard copy magazine for the present time.
This conclusion fell upon Steamshovel with one issue left under production, and this in turn led to a survival strategy. Steamshovel Press #23 is now available electronically, as a PDF file. For subscribers, this means that they need only supply their e-mail address to have it sent. Newbies can receive it for $10, payable the standard way (via money order or check payable to "Kenn Thomas" at POB 210553, St. Louis, MO 63121), or via Steamshovel's new PayPal account.
It may be possible to salvage Steamshovel from the junk yard of conspiracy zines past if this new electronic form of the magazine sells well, with the goal of bringing back the hard copy. Steamshovel can produce a new hard copy for as little as a thousand dollars, and in this era of niche marketing that's not such a large amount.
In addition, however, finally moving all the way into electronic publishing may push the operation into new realms. If this works, Steamshovel has plans to make available a wide range of materials from its archives through electronic format, including PDFs of many classic Steamshovel books; other arcane an underground literature; and DVDs of things taken from the airwaves and public events that shed new light on the parapolitical environs.
The first of this new product line: the lecture I gave at Conspiracy Con in San Jose earlier this year. This hour-long DVD costs $10, post paid. Its title: "Parapolitics On the Planet Earth", and in it I explore the changing meaning of the JFK assassination in the popular culture, replete with video of the Zapruder film; Abraham Zapruder himself just in from the "shoot"; and the film's first TV airing-all of it leading to a discussion of the most currently relevant assassinations, centering on Alexander Litvinenko. Plus I cover the history of pop culture's falling out with the covert world, from the 1970s defections of the likes of John Stockwell and Phillip Agee to the Valerie Plame affair, connected as they are to the Intelligence Identities Protection Act. So it's a nice little trot over current affairs seen through the JFK prism.
None of that is a hard sell, just "what it is" in the parlance. Steamshovelpress.com remains the magazine presence on the web, and I still pop around on various conspiracy discussion lists with various insights and footnotes placing current and historical events into the perspective of the conspiracy minded reading public. Gasp, a Steamshovel blog may yet appear. The pathway back to actually producing the magazine, however, will be this electronic one, and I hope readers are willing to follow along with it.
by Kenn Thomas
SteamshovelPress.com
Good news! The new Steamshovel-related book, Conspiracy Files, is now available in Australia. The publishers plan US and UK editions some time in the near future, but anxious readers who want to check it out right way, go to www.murdochbooks.com.au/conspiracy.htm and have it shipped.
The book has a slick, color, nice interior graphics, hardback design.
It presents a gamut of historical conspiracy information useful to the novice and at the same time a wealth of arcane detail that will satisfy even veteran conspiracy watchers that they came away learning something new. Kinda like an issue of Steamshovel.
That leads to the bad news. As many readers have noticed, the Steamshovel has stalled for some time now. It has no advertising revenue streams and the subscription money it brings in has been barely enough over the years to get its motor to turn over.
For many months it has survived only on the well wishes of its considerable and devoted audience. Alas, with the last round of postal and printer increases, even that no longer makes it possible to continue to produce the hard copy magazine for the present time.
This conclusion fell upon Steamshovel with one issue left under production, and this in turn led to a survival strategy. Steamshovel Press #23 is now available electronically, as a PDF file. For subscribers, this means that they need only supply their e-mail address to have it sent. Newbies can receive it for $10, payable the standard way (via money order or check payable to "Kenn Thomas" at POB 210553, St. Louis, MO 63121), or via Steamshovel's new PayPal account.
It may be possible to salvage Steamshovel from the junk yard of conspiracy zines past if this new electronic form of the magazine sells well, with the goal of bringing back the hard copy. Steamshovel can produce a new hard copy for as little as a thousand dollars, and in this era of niche marketing that's not such a large amount.
In addition, however, finally moving all the way into electronic publishing may push the operation into new realms. If this works, Steamshovel has plans to make available a wide range of materials from its archives through electronic format, including PDFs of many classic Steamshovel books; other arcane an underground literature; and DVDs of things taken from the airwaves and public events that shed new light on the parapolitical environs.
The first of this new product line: the lecture I gave at Conspiracy Con in San Jose earlier this year. This hour-long DVD costs $10, post paid. Its title: "Parapolitics On the Planet Earth", and in it I explore the changing meaning of the JFK assassination in the popular culture, replete with video of the Zapruder film; Abraham Zapruder himself just in from the "shoot"; and the film's first TV airing-all of it leading to a discussion of the most currently relevant assassinations, centering on Alexander Litvinenko. Plus I cover the history of pop culture's falling out with the covert world, from the 1970s defections of the likes of John Stockwell and Phillip Agee to the Valerie Plame affair, connected as they are to the Intelligence Identities Protection Act. So it's a nice little trot over current affairs seen through the JFK prism.
None of that is a hard sell, just "what it is" in the parlance. Steamshovelpress.com remains the magazine presence on the web, and I still pop around on various conspiracy discussion lists with various insights and footnotes placing current and historical events into the perspective of the conspiracy minded reading public. Gasp, a Steamshovel blog may yet appear. The pathway back to actually producing the magazine, however, will be this electronic one, and I hope readers are willing to follow along with it.
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