Former Russian PM 'was poisoned'
Thursday, 30 Nov 2006 19:23
Yegor Gaidar was prime minister during Boris Yeltsin's time in power
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A former Russian prime minister may have been poisoned, his aide has said today.
Yegor Gaidar, who was part of the government of former Russian president Boris Yeltsin in the 1990s, fell ill in Ireland last week while on a promotional trip to publicise his book.
The 50-year-old is now in hospital in Moscow where he said to be getting better, but tests are continuing to establish what caused his sudden illness, which occurred shortly after the death of ex-Russian spy Alexander Litvinenko in a London hospital last Thursday.
His spokesman Valery Natarov said in a statement that the doctors treating him feel that the cause of his illness is not "natural".
"Doctors don't see a natural reason for the poisoning and they have not been able to detect any natural substance known to them," he said.
"So obviously we're talking about poisoning [and] it was not natural poisoning."
The former prime minister's daughter has echoed the aide's concerns, telling BBC News 24 in a phone interview: "So far the doctors cannot see any other reason for the condition of my father than that he was poisoned," adding that they still need some more information from the doctors in Dublin before they could make an official diagnosis.
Maria Gaidar went on to suggest that if the illness which led her father to collapse at a conference last Friday was indeed caused by him being poisoned then it was likely to be political in nature.
"I believe it is a political poisoning, because there are no personal or business reasons…[but] I don't know who this could have been exactly," she added.
She also confirmed that her father is "making good medical progress" and that the doctors "cannot see any threat for his life".
A statement from the Irish department of foreign affairs Dublin statement confirmed that they were aware of Mr Gaidar's illness but appeared to contradict the aide's version of events.
"We have no reasons to believe that there was anything untoward about him falling ill last week," the statement said.
Scotland Yard are continuing to investigate the death of 43-year-old Russian exile Mr Litvinenko after tests revealed he had traces of the radioactive substance polonium-210 (po-210) in his body.