UK expulsion of Russian diplomats political: Russia

Britain is more interested in playing politics than solving the poisoning murder of ex-Russian agent Alexander Litvinenko, senior Russian prosecutors said on Monday.

The prosecutors hit back at British claims that Moscow was blocking efforts to solve the crime, saying the British investigation was flawed and had been too hasty in naming a Russian man as the chief suspect.

"I do not think our friends should criticize our justice system. I think their efforts would be better spent improving their own system," Alexander Zvyagintsev, Russia's deputy Prosecutor-General, told a news conference.

"Sometimes it seems to us that Britain is not so much interested in the supremacy of the law as it is in the ambitions of certain officials."

The murder of Litvinenko, who died from radioactive poisoning in a London hospital last November, has brought relations between Britain and Moscow to their lowest point since the end of the Cold War.

British prosecutors want to try Russian Andrei Lugovoy for the murder, but Moscow has refused to hand him over, citing a constitutional ban on the extradition of Russian citizens.

London earlier this month expelled four Russian diplomats in protest at Moscow's refusal to extradite Lugovoy. In a tit-for-tat response, Moscow threw out four British diplomats.

Britain's decision to expel the diplomats was "plainly groundless, inappropriate, unjustified and lies exclusively in a political framework," said Zvyagintsev. "We refused extradition on the basis of the law."

He said it was also "discourteous" of the British government to expect Russia would amend its constitution to clear the way for Lugovoy's extradition.

PEOPLE "PUT AT RISK"

British Prime Minister Gordon Brown denied his country was politicizing the Litvinenko case.

"We cannot tolerate a situation where all the evidence is that not only was one person assassinated but many other people were put at risk," he told a news conference in London.

"We want the Russian authorities even at this stage to recognize that it is their responsibility to extradite for trial the Russian citizen who has been identified by prosecuting authorities," Brown added.

The case is politically charged because Litvinenko's associates -- who include vocal critics of the Kremlin now living in London -- accused Russian President Vladimir Putin of ordering his murder. The Kremlin denies involvement.

Another senior prosecutor said British detectives investigating the Litvinenko murder seemed to have decided from the outset that Lugovoy was guilty.

Britain was displaying "a one-sided approach to the investigation and a desire not to see the contradictions," said Andrei Mayorov, deputy head of the Prosecutor-General's serious crimes department.

Russia was open to requests from Britain to try any suspect in Russia, but only if sufficient proof of guilt was provided, said Zvyagintsev.

"Unfortunately, without documentary material and expert testimony we do not have enough the information to open a prosecution here in Russia," he said.

REUTERS