Tycoon Admits Plotting To Overthrow Putin By Force

By Cernig

How bizarre. If you were plotting with un-named others to forcibly overthrow the ruler of of one of the largest and most powerful nations on earth, would you admit it to a newspaper?

Russian tycoon Boris Berezovsky just did exactly that.

"We need to use force to change this regime," he said. "It isn't possible to change this regime through democratic means. There can be no change without force, pressure." Asked if he was effectively fomenting a revolution, he said: "You are absolutely correct."

Although Mr Berezovsky, with an estimated fortune of £850m, may have the means to finance such a plot, and although he enjoyed enormous political influence in Russia before being forced into exile, he said he could not provide details to back up his claims because the information was too sensitive.

...Mr Berezovsky [claims] to be in close contact with members of Russia's political elite who, he says, share his view that Mr Putin is damaging Russia by rolling back democratic reforms, smothering opposition, centralising power and flouting the country's constitution.

"There is no chance of regime change through democratic elections," he says. "If one part of the political elite disagrees with another part of the political elite - that is the only way in Russia to change the regime. I try to move that."

While declining to describe these contacts - and alleging that they would be murdered if they were identified - he maintained that he was offering his "experience and ideology" to members of the country's political elite, as well as "my understanding of how it could be done". He added: "There are also practical steps which I am doing now, and mostly it is financial."

...As well as claiming to be financing and encouraging coup plotters in Moscow, Mr Berezovsky said he had dedicated much of the last six years to "trying to destroy the positive image of Putin" that many in the west held, portraying him whenever possible as a dangerously anti-democratic figure. He said he had also opposed the Russian president through Kommersant, the influential Russian newspaper which he controlled until last year.

The Russian government is furious, of course. Dmitry Peskov, the Kremlin's chief spokesman, said: "In accordance with our legislation [his remarks are] being treated as a crime." However, the tycoon has refugee status in the UK, and a British passport and it is unclear whether a court would overturn that status to allow him to be extradited - in particular because of allegations of an assasination order involving another Russian, Alexander Litvenenko:

Mr Berezovsky said he was unconcerned by any threat to strip him of his refugee status. "Straw wasn't in a position to take that decision. A judge in court said it wasn't in the jurisdiction of Straw."

He added that there was even less chance of such a decision being taken following the polonium-210 poisoning last November of his former employee, Alexander Litvinenko. "Today the reality is different because of the Litvinenko case."

...A few months after the [2000 presidential] election Mr Berezovsky fled Russia, and applied successfully for asylum in the UK after Mr Litvinenko, an officer with the KGB's successor, the FSB, came forward to say he had been ordered to murder the tycoon.

...Last month Mr Berezovsky was questioned by two detectives from the Russian prosecutor general's office who were in London to investigate the death of Mr Litvinenko. He has denied claims that he refused to answer many of their questions.

Last night the Kremlin said Russian authorities might want to question him again in the light of his interview with the Guardian. "I now believe our prosecutor general's office has got lots of questions for Mr Berezovsky," said Mr Peskov. He added: "His words are very interesting. This is a very sensitive issue."

I have no idea what to make of this one. I have difficulty believing a serious coup plotter would announce his intentions to the world and the object of his plot via a British newspaper. Doesn't he think that Russian intelligence is capable of running down every contact he makes inside Russia from now on? So do we take him at his word or do we look for another agenda? Maybe Berezovsky thinks just putting the idea of a coup out there will be enough to get every Russian bigwig paranoid and looking over his own shoulder. That could be enough to create a number of different coup movements all on its own, I suppose.

And the polonium murder connection? Just bizarre. Move over John Le Carre, truth is stranger than fiction.