Andrei Lugovoy, a contact of poisoned Russian ex-spy Alexander Litvinenko, is suffering from radiation poisoning, Interfax news agency said on Friday, quoting medical sources.
”Disruption in the functioning of some organs affected by radiation nuclides has been found,” the agency quoted a source as saying.
It said it had more than one source for the information, which came from Lugovoy’s medical notes.
Businessmen Lugovoy and Dmitry Kovtun were among the last who saw Litvinenko in London on November 1, the day he fell ill. Litvinenko died on November 23, poisoned by the highly radioactive substance polonium 210.
Interfax earlier quoted medical sources as saying that Kovtun, who is being treated in the same Moscow hospital as Lugovoy, was suffering from acute radiation poisoning and was in serious condition.
”Lugovoy’s condition is considerably better than that of Kovtun, but he also has symptoms of contamination,” the sources told Interfax.
British and Russian investigators have begun questioning Lugovoy, local media reported on Friday.
”At this moment a team of investigators from the prosecutor general’s office, in the presence of specialists from Scotland Yard, is questioning Lugovoy,” RIA news agency quoted a source close to the case as saying.
A spokesperson for the prosecutor general’s office said she could not immediately confirm the report. — Reuters