Witness Questioned in Spy Death Case

A Russian police car is parked near the gates of the British Embassy in Moscow on Wednesday, Dec. 6, 2006. Andrei Lugovoi, a key witness in the radiation poisoning case of former Russian agent Alexander Litvinenko, will meet with British investigators on Wednesday, a business associate said. Lugovoi traveled to London three times over the month before Litvinenko's death and met with Litvinenko four times, according to Russian media. (AP Photo/Misha Japaridze ) (Misha Japaridze - AP)

MOSCOW -- Scotland Yard called the radiation poisoning of former Russian intelligence agent Alexander Litvinenko a murder Wednesday, as Russian and British investigators questioned a witness in the case in Moscow.

Two weeks after Litvinenko's death, the trail of trace amounts of the radioactive substance polonium-210 continued to expand Wednesday, as authorities said they discovered tiny amounts at a London soccer stadium and the British Embassy in Moscow.

Litvinenko's family, meanwhile, prepared for his funeral, as friends described his deathbed conversion to Islam.

The 43-year-old Litvinenko, a critic of Russian President Vladimir Putin, died Nov. 23 in London, where he lived in self-imposed exile.

After his death, a friend read a statement in which Litvinenko called Putin "the person responsible" for his death. The Kremlin denied the allegation.

The investigation began even before the radioactive poison killed Litvinenko, but until Wednesday police had not formally declared the case a homicide.

"Detectives ... have reached the stage where it is felt appropriate to treat it as an allegation of murder," London's Metropolitan Police said in a statement. "It is important to stress that we have reached no conclusions as to the means employed, the motive or the identity of those who might be responsible for Mr. Litvinenko's death."

Interfax news agency reported that British and Russian investigators on Tuesday and Wednesday interrogated Dmitry Kovtun, one of at least two Russian businessmen who met Litvinenko in London's Millennium Hotel on Nov. 1, hours before he fell ill.

Kovtun and an associate, Andrei Lugovoi, have told the Russian media they went to London as part of a group of Moscow soccer fans, and met briefly with their exiled countryman to discuss business matters. Later, they attended a match between CSKA Moscow and Arsenal at the Emirates Stadium in north London.

Both men have told reporters in Moscow that someone is trying to frame them in Litvinenko's death.

Boris Berezovsky, a flamboyant Russian tycoon and political foe of Putin, routinely entertains friends and associates in a private box at the stadium. Litvinenko joined Berezovsky's emigre circle after fleeing Russia in 2000.

Lugovoi is thought to have asked Berezovsky for tickets, but the tycoon's box was full and Lugovoi's party of eight received tickets to seats elsewhere in the stadium.