The photo went around the world: Alexander Litvinenko in a hospital bed, in a green gown, his head bald after being poisoned with radioactive polonium. He looks directly into the camera. The former Russian agent died three days after the photo was taken. Even if the doctors had found out earlier what was the cause of his initially mysterious illness, he had no chance.
The photo can also be seen on the cover of the book that his wife Marina Litvinenko has now written, 20 years after her husband's murder. One day at the end of October, at a meeting in a park in north London, she holds the first copy in her hands.
Not far away, in Highgate cemetery, her husband is buried in a lead-lined, radiation-proof coffin.
"At that time I thought that the politicians would act"
“Looking at this photo is always difficult for me,” she says. "Back then I wanted to stop it from being done. I didn't want the world to see him like that and thought Sasha would get better soon." When Marina Litvinenko speaks of her husband, she uses the pet form of Alexander. "Sasha" - that's what it says on his gravestone.
But she also knows the importance of this photo: "If the photo didn't exist, then after his death it would have been difficult to prove what the Russian regime is capable of." The photo, taken by a family friend and filmmaker, was also intended to send a message.
The West, she will say later in the conversation, has made a big mistake. Litvinenko is convinced that her husband's murder should have been a wake-up call for the West, even back then. A sharper response could have put Vladimir Putin's Russia in its place and potentially prevented war against Ukraine.
Serious criticism
There is also a photo on the cover of the book that shows Alexander and Marina Litvinenko in happy times. He hugs her, they both smile. In 2000 they left Russia with their young son and were granted political asylum in London.
Alexander Litvinenko, an officer and employee of the Russian secret service, publicly warned in the late 1990s that the Russian secret service leadership was giving illegal orders for murders and kidnappings, including internally, and was corrupt. He openly showed his face at a press conference in Moscow and was temporarily arrested a short time later.
Litvinenko also wanted to hand over his evidence to the then intelligence chief Vladimir Putin and met him personally. But he showed no interest; Litvinenko should keep the documents. At the turn of the millennium, Putin became President of Russia.
"Employees of the secret service FSB very rarely contradict illegal orders - and above all they do not speak about them publicly," says the renowned British Russia expert Mark Galeotti, who specializes in the Russian security and intelligence apparatus. "Litvinenko must have realized at the time how serious his press conference was - and that after his escape he continued to publicly criticize Putin and his system."
In London, Litvinenko also worked with British intelligence at the time. For a long time, the family was financially supported by oligarch Boris Berezovsky, who also lived in London and had now become a sharp critic of Putin.
Putin's conclusions from the West's reaction
On November 1, 2006, Litvinenko was poisoned in a London hotel bar. Two men from Russia, Andrei Lugovoi and Dmitri Kovtun, whom Litvinenko considered potential like-minded people, left traces of polonium all over London and even in Hamburg as they prepared for the crime. They had mixed the rare, radioactive poison into Litvinenko's tea. Russia refused to extradite the two, even when the British filed charges.
In Great Britain, a judicial investigation for which Marina Litvinenko had to fight for years came to the conclusion in 2016: It is likely that the Russian secret service and Putin personally approved the poisoning. This was an important step for Marina Litvinenko and her son.
To this day, she sees the biggest problem as the fact that the United Kingdom did not receive enough support from the rest of the West after the murder. "A few diplomats were expelled, and people said things like: 'You can't do something like that.'" But Putin concluded from the reaction: "Either you're not doing anything because you can't, because you're afraid, or because you don't want to endanger our joint gas and oil deals." In this way, the West helped to encourage Putin and his system and make him richer, said Marina Litvinenko.
“They didn’t want to alienate Russia”
Russia expert Galeotti also says: The United Kingdom could have done more after Litvinenko's murder, for example imposing sanctions against Russia - and the government certainly considered that. "But that would have been irrelevant if we went it alone. The Russian money would simply have gone to Germany, France or the USA," said Galeotti. For him the “shameful truth” is:
Litvinko: Europe must stand firmly on Ukraine's side
Marina Litvinko demands that Europe must now continue to stand firmly at Ukraine's side in the fight against Putin's Russia: with sanctions and with military aid, especially at a time when US President Donald Trump is threatening to withdraw support from Ukraine.
She herself realized early on that the US President could not be relied on: "When he was asked about the murder of Sasha and the role of Putin and the secret service, he immediately said: That hasn't been proven." But she says: "If Putin really gets into problems in Ukraine and because of sanctions, then Trump will drop him too."
She hopes that the Russian president will one day have to stand trial, ideally in Russia itself. However, it is important to Marina Litvinenko that her book is not a political manifesto, but also a love letter to her husband. She wants to continue to ensure that Alexander Litvinenko is not forgotten.
