In 2006, her husband, former Russian intelligence officer Alexander Litvinenko, died in his exile in London—due to a poisoning with the radioactive substance polonium. Only a few hours before his death, Litvinenko was convinced that it was Kremlin boss Putin who silenced him. Since 1998, Litvinenko had publicly cast criticism on the intelligence service and Kremlin boss Putin on several accounts: Among other things, he raised the allegation that attacks on residential homes in Moscow served as a pretext for the Chechnya war. Litvinenko also conducted research on the murder of Moscow journalist Anna Politkovskaya, shortly before his death.
Marina Litvinenko wants justice for her husband, and she unwaveringly dedicates her efforts to the truth. Together with a friend of the family, Alex Goldfarb, she first published a bill of indictment on the “Death of a Dissident”—at a time when certain aspects of the case were still unclear. Only ten years after that, as a result of late investigations, the British Supreme Court concluded that the Russian intelligence service had commissioned the murder and that President Putin “probably” approved of it. In 2021, the European Court of Human Rights described Russian involvement as the “only plausible explanation” for the murder. 

Marina Litvinenko
Professional Dancer, Book Author “Death of a Dissident,” wife of murdered Russian secret service officer Alexander Litvinenko

In conversation with
Alexandra Föderl-Schmid 
Head of News for German daily newspaper Süddeutsche Zeitung