A British tabloid claimed Wednesday that one of its journalists "may have been contaminated by the radioactive poison that killed ex-Russian spy Alexander Litvinenko," after meeting one of Litvinenko's contacts.
Viktor Mikhailov said, "This is ridiculous. A person infected with polonium-210 cannot leave traces, unless he held the polonium-210 in his hands."
Litvinenko, a defector from the Russian security service and a close associate of fugitive Russian oligarch Boris Berezovsky, died last Thursday in a London hospital. British health officials said Friday a large dose of radioactive Po-210, a highly toxic uranium by-product, had been found in his body.
UK health authorities and police made it clear that the radioactive isotope cannot be transmitted through the skin, and said the risk of contamination from radiation found at various sites across London is very low.
The former nuclear minister said, "polonium-210 emits alpha-radiation, and cannot leave traces while in a human body," he said.
Mikhailov said the production site of an isotope can be easily identified, as isotopes differ depending on the technology used to produce them.
"If we were in possession of a sample, we could definitely say whether it was produced in Russia or not," he said.
Pathologists are expected to conduct post-mortem examination of Litvinenko's body Friday at the Royal London Hospital.
