The upscale London neighborhood of Mayfair has not been the best place to meet recently, at least not for Russian dissidents. That's something Norberto Andrade, the barkeeper at the Millenium Hotel in Mayfair, can readily confirm.

He still remembers quite clearly the group of four men he served on Nov. 1, 2006, including a certain Alexander Litvinenko. Andrade was just serving a gin and tonic when the mood at the table suddenly turned sour and there was a sudden commotion which, the waiter is convinced, was designed to cause a distraction.

He suspects it was at that very moment that someone sprayed the radioactive isotope polonium-210 into the green tea that Litvinenko was drinking. That fits the findings from the investigation into the former KGB agent's later death by poisoning: Chemists found corresponding particles on the table top and on a picture frame. When clearing the table, Andrado also noticed that the remaining tea was more yellow than usual, more viscous and somehow "sticky."

Last week the waiter with the keen eye for detail publicly revealed his supporting role in the spy story that chilled half the world last fall, making him the first witness to talk to the press.

He could hardly have chosen a better moment. At the same time details emerged of a plot to kill Russian billionaire Boris Berezovsky, a prominent critic of Russian President Vladimir Putin, at the Hilton Hotel in Mayfair last month. Berezovsky was going to be killed by a hitman. But this hit was to be more conventional: not with polonium but with an old fashioned gun.

Suspicions of yet another assassination attempt in the Russian expatriate milieu caused diplomatic frictions between London and Moscow, which became more bitter day by day. Naturally, the British government is not prepared to stand by and watch as London becomes the scene of Russian score-settling, and it is irritated because the Kremlin refuses to extradite the main suspect in the Litvinenko case. The Kremlin, for its part, is angry because Berezovsky is constantly berating Putin from London, safe in the knowledge that he is protected there.

The British wouldn't dream of turfing out the wealthy dissident. So why should the Russians accommodate them in the Litvinenko case?

No Prospects of Extraditions

After making enquiries in Moscow, the British investigators are fully convinced they know who poisoned Litvinenko: former KGB security operative Andrei Lugovoi, one of the men from the Millenium Hotel meeting. Lugovoi is living happily in Moscow, where he gives boastful interviews and enjoys what amounts to state protection. The Russian constitution is no more likely to allow the extradition of the country's citizens to foreign judicial systems than British Common Law or the German constitution does.

Berezovsky's would-be killer is alleged to have flown to England from Russia at short notice and to have been accompanied by a child, just like Lugovoi before him. He was under observation from the minute he arrived at London's Heathrow Airport on June 16. Berezovsky was warned by intelligence agents and temporarily left the country. The suspect, said to be in his mid-thirties, was arrested by the police after five days and questioned before being expelled by the British immigration authorities. Apparently the man intended to start an argument with Berezovsky at the Hilton and then execute him with a shot to the head.

The former oligarch remained unscathed, but it is Gordon Brown who has suffered from the episode -- at least politically. His foreign minister expelled four Russian diplomats from the country last Monday and Moscow responded 72 hours later, by telling four British embassy employees to leave Russia.

From Moscow's point of view, extraditing Lugovoi would be a needless gesture of accommodation, almost one of meekness, since the British have consistently refused similar Russian requests in the past. The Russians are systematically blocking the Litvinenko investigation and have shown no interest, to date, in establishing the killer's identity themselves, despite promises to do so.

Brown, on the other hand, wanted to emerge victorious from his first foreign policy trial of strength and resorted to methods from the ice age of the Cold War. "You only shoot yourself in the foot that way," says James Nixey, director of the Russian program at the Royal Institute of International Affairs in London. "Both sides are putting trade relations worth billions at stake," he adds. Britain is currently the biggest investor in Russia and there are 250,000 Russians living in London, with the wealthiest owning 20 percent of the city's luxury real estate.

And virtually no international issue can be resolved by Brown and other European politicians without the help of Putin. The struggle against terrorism, for example, which is particularly important for Britain, has not been made any easier by Russia's decision last Thursday to freeze all cooperation in this area. Moscow has also decided to no longer provide British government officials with visas or to send official representatives to the United Kingdom for the time being.

A Thorn in Moscow's Side

The Kremlin has been trying to get Berezovsky extradited for years. The dissident, who is well known for his erratic temper, has called tirelessly for Putin's overthrow. But his admission that he is financing the political opposition does a disservice to those who share his views, such as Other Russia, an umbrella organization of opposition groups led by former chess champion Garry Kasparov.

Berezovsky's interviews in Western Europe are invariably followed by fresh investigations by the public prosecutor's office in Moscow. Sometimes he is accused of planning a coup, and sometimes of being a spy. Berezovsky was deputy head of the Russian Security Council from 1996 to 1997 and he has been accused of passing council documents on to the British. This could explain one favor the British Interior Ministry did for him: After he had been granted asylum, the ministry issued him with a passport under the name of Platon Yelenin.

Back home, on the other hand, the billionaire is no longer thought of very highly. His influence with opposition groups and parties is practically zero. The man who became one of the wealthiest and most influential Russians under Yeltsin no longer has any allies.

In London, he formed a vocal trio of dissidents along with Chechen separatist leader Akhmed Zakayev and Litvinenko. The Russian parliament in 2006 passed a law allowing its intelligence agents to liquidate political enemies abroad, provided they are terrorists. On Moscow's reading, the category of terrorist includes Chechen politicians such as Zakayev. As early as February 2004, Russian agents killed Chechnya's former President Zelimkhan Yandarbiyev by bomb in Qatar.