MOSCOW, December 4 (RIA Novosti) - The press secretary of former acting Prime Minister Yegor Gaidar denied Monday information circulated by French media that Gaidar allegedly met with ex-FSB officer Alexander Litvinenko November 1.
"Yegor [Gaidar] did not know Litvinenko," Valery Natarov told RIA Novosti. "It's known for certain that Gaidar was in Moscow November 1."
Litvinenko, a security service defector who was allegedly investigating the murder of journalist and Kremlin critic Anna Politkovskaya, died in London November 23 from suspected radiation poisoning. A lethal dose of polonium 210, a neutron-emitting element often used in nuclear triggers, was found in his body.
Following his death, Western media circulated a statement in which Litvinenko blamed the Kremlin in general, and President Vladimir Putin specifically, for his alleged poisoning. The Kremlin has denied any involvement.
Gaidar, 50, a former acting prime minister and architect of economic reforms in post-Soviet Russia, began vomiting suddenly and fainted at a conference in Dublin November 24. He is now in a Moscow hospital.
Doctors said he was poisoned but have not identified the substance yet, saying only that no radiation was found in his body.
