The Russian suspected in Britain of murdering Kremlin critic Alexander Litvinenko is unlikely ever to stand trial and the affair could become a longstanding sore in relations, analysts said today.
The Crown Prosecution Service announced yesterday it wanted to bring Andrei Lugovoy before a
Boris Berezovsky, a London-based Russian billionaire who was a friend of Mr Litvinenko and Putin opponent, on BBC radio
British court and charge him with the fatal poisoning of Mr Litvninenko in London last November.
But Russia's constitution forbids it from extraditing its citizens.
The naming of Mr Lugovoy as the murder suspect set Britain and Russia, former Cold War enemies, on a diplomatic collision course. Analysts said it could cause a further deterioration in frosty relations and deepen Russia's isolation from the West.
"[Russian President Vladimir] Putin's government will never allow the extradition of Lugovoy," Boris Berezovsky, a London-based Russian billionaire who was a friend of Mr Litvinenko and Putin opponent, said on BBC radio.
The Kremlin denied the claim but it renewed anger that Britain had given refugee status to Mr Berezovsky, who is wanted on corruption charges and who, the Kremlin says, is using London as a base to undermine the Russian President.
Mr Lugovoy, a former KGB agent who now runs a private business in Russia, sounded calm and untroubled in a brief telephone interview after the Brotish announced the intention to prosecute.
"Of course I consider myself not guilty. I am not saying anything else. Of course I am not guilty," he said.
Russian prosecutors could prosecute him using evidence supplied by British police. But former Russian Prosecutor General Yuri Skuratov said that was unlikely.
"Naturally, on this sort of case no one is going to do that," he told Nezavisimaya Gazetanewspaper.
The worst punishment Mr Lugovoy would face was being unable to travel outside Russia for fear of arrest, except to friendly countries which were unlikely to extradite him, Mr Skuratov added.
Mr Litvinenko died an agonising death in a London hospital last year after ingesting a fatal dose of polonium 210, a radioactive isotope.
In a letter read out by friends after his death, he accused Mr Putin of being responsible.
"The latest developments represent yet another blow to Russia's relations with the West," said Yaroslav Lissovolik, an analyst at Deutsche UFG.
"While Russia's relations with the UK had already cooled in recent years ... the latest round of the 'Litvinenko affair' is bound to make matters even worse."
Asked about the case at a news conference, Russia's First Deputy Prime Minister Sergei Ivanov said: "I do not see any link between the investigation into the death of Litvinenko and British-Russian relations."