Times of London: Who poisoned Yushchenko? (poisoning confirmed)

[Newsjock]

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/article/0,,3-1393172,00.html

December 08, 2004
From Jeremy Page in Kiev
Doctors at the Austrian clinic that treated Ukraine’s opposition leader confirm there was a plot to kill him


MEDICAL experts have confirmed that Viktor Yushchenko, Ukraine’s opposition leader, was poisoned in an attempt on his life during election campaigning, the doctor who supervised his treatment at an Austrian clinic said yesterday.

Doctors at Vienna’s exclusive Rudolfinerhaus clinic are within days of identifying the substance that left Mr Yushchenko’s face disfigured with cysts and lesions, Nikolai Korpan told The Times in a telephone interview.

Specialists in Britain, the United States and France had helped to establish that it was a biological agent, a chemical agent or, most likely, a rare poison that struck him down in the run-up to the presidential election, he said. Doctors needed to examine Mr Yushchenko again at the clinic in Vienna to confirm their diagnosis but were in no doubt that the substance was administered deliberately, he said.

“This is no longer a question for discussion,” Dr Korpan said. “We are now sure that we can confirm which substance caused this illness. He received this substance from other people who had a specific aim.”

Asked if the aim had been to kill him, Dr Korpan said: “Yes, of course.”

more

[VegasWolf]

1. My guess would be awol. n/t

[Maccagirl]

2. The plot thickens...

[Carl Brennan]

3. Now, let's see who made this witch's brew. That is going to

prove very interesting.

[goodboy]

4. wow. I don't know what to say...

on edit: could someone please post the side-by-side of his pictures....you know the one's I mean?

[Newsjock]

8. Here

[goodboy]

10. You're right...much better...er...or....worse...you know what I mean.

[American Tragedy]

38. That poor man, he doesn't even look like the same person

I can honestly say with all of my heart that I would not wish that on my worst enemies.

[Pachamama]

47. I didn't even realize that it was the same man until it was pointed out

what happened to him...He looks like he aged 20 years and he was a handsome man....

I think this has Putin's KGB thug hands all over it...scary...

[elf]

54. I heard that weeks ago from my Ukrainian friend

for later

[Cicero]

61. Oh that poor man

I daresay he'll probably have ill health as well for the rest of his life, however long that ends up being. (Probably shortened by the poison, too.)

Later,

[ooglymoogly]

65. oh you conspiracy theorists

what will you come up with next...i suppose bushe's election was a conspiracy...if you believed all those conspiracy theories ...we'd be living in a dictatorship........

[lenidog]

5. Sounds like something

An ex-KGB station chief might try to get rid of a impediment to his plans

[bullimiami]

6. plots and plots

so who did it.

Putin in bid to kill him? Pretty incompetent, hes still alive. Strange choice of poisons for an assassination.

Bushco, CiA, or Yushenko himself? To engender sympathy and anti-Putin sentiment? . Obviously disfigured but alive.


Hard to know what to think in this great game they are playing.

[ilovenicepeople]

20. I'm curious about the sympathy angle as well

is this disfigurement of Yushenko effect him adversly besides looking like Brian Adams?

[RUMMYisFROSTED]

24. "Strange choice of poisons for an assassination."

:think:

[goodboy]

7. I found some side-by-side pics here:

<>

[KoKo]

26. Even his nose looks completely different. Are you positive this is the

same person? Geeze what kind of poison can completly change your nose shape and age you like that!

[goodboy]

31. some kind of Dioxin...I don't know.

[goclark]

36. Strange! Is he the Manchurian Candidate?

The nose is doing a complete plastic surgery to enlarge it?

What kind of poison does that to a person?

[Flammable Materials]

9. Has there been any improvement in his condition?

Or is he permanently disfigured?

[Newsjock]

11. Looking pretty bad in a pic taken yesterday

http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&u=/041207/481/xkiv10312070113


Opposition leader Viktor Yushchenko looks on after his meeting with Kremlin-backed Prime Minister Viktor Yanukovych at the presidential Mariinsky palace, Kiev, Monday, Dec. 6, 2004. Ukraine's political rivals agreed at European-brokered talks early Tuesday on legislation to ensure a fair vote in the Dec. 26 presidential rematch but failed to agree on constitutional amendments trimming presidential powers. (AP Photo/Efrem Lukatsky)

[Flammable Materials]

14. Fucking Christ.

My heart goes out to the man. If he looks this bad on the outside, imagine what his insides must look like.

[politicat]

27. Looks like chlordane or chloracne to me.

I'm not a dermatologist, but it reminded me of some of the guys who got exposed to high levels of dioxin in the Southwest. Chloracne is a severe acne related to dioxin exposure.

From the CDC occupational disease website, describing the picture above:
Chlordane is an extremely refractory type of acne caused by certain halogenated aromatic chemicals and can be certain halogogenated aromatic chemicals and can be accompaned by systemic toxicity. It represents one of the most sensitive indicators of biologic response to these chemicals. Chloracne in this herbicide production worker involved almost every follicular orifice on his face and neck with comedones, papules and cystlike lesions.

It can be fatal if you're exposed to too high a dose; it also causes cancer.

I hope they catch the rat-bastard who did this to him. Yushchenko's not too bad as Ukraine politicians go.

Pcat

[prolesunited]

32. Sure looks like it

Does that go away with time or is it permanent?

[politicat]

41. It will go away, but it scars, like any acne.

It also means he can't be re-exposed to the dioxin.

I'm not sure if dioxin is bio-accumulative or not, and I don't have my copy of Zodiac handy at the moment. (Easy to understand, accurate environmental chemistry wrapped up in a novel form!) If it's not bio-accumulative, then once it's out of his system, he will get back to normal, as long as he's not exposed again. If it is bio-accumulative, then he's going to have to live with the damage and make sure he's careful not to encounter any further dioxin or covalent chlorine.

Pcat

[Cadence]

42. I wonder what the treatment is?

That's terrible.

[politicat]

43. basically, time... laser abrasion is currently under investigation in UK

Here's a site on it... nasty bugger of a condition.

http://dermnetnz.org/acne/chloracne.html

Pcat

[LiberalEsto]

48. Dioxin is EXTREMELY bioaccumulative

Those long molecules collect in fatty tissue and never leave. The molecules are almost impossible to break down, which is why they were used as lubricants in transformers -- they weren't affected by heat.

Dioxins concentrate in fatty fish that live in contaminated water, then work their way up the food chain. They tend to build up in women's breast tissue.

[AngryAmish]

53. Wouldn't a skin fat biopsy prove dioxin then?

[sangh0]

66. Yes, and they've done that. It's not dioxin and it's not chloracne

They don't know what it is yet

[barb162]

35. I hate to say it but he looks like he's gonna die

[leftchick]

46. awful....

poor guy. At least he is still alive.

[mdhunter]

12. Politics in the US has it flaws, but let's be happy the system stops this

[Mike Niendorff]

15. JFK, MLK, RFK ...

not to mention : Paul Wellstone, Mel Carnahan.

Hell, even Reagan had to survive an assassin's bullet. Point being, we're not at all above this in America. We just like to think we are.


MDN

[Blue_Tires]

17. don't forget about the hundreds of times

we tried to whack Castro

[jobycom]

44. Scratch Carnahan

That was an accident caused by a pilot who should not have been instrument rated. You can see that pilot losing control on the radio transcripts.

But you are right, we are a bloody, violent nation with prettier wrapping paper. I wouldn't put any nation above us in that department.

[Just Me]

51. Well, anthrax sorta' pops into my mind. n/t

[BiggJawn]

13. I'd say it was BUSHCO.

The KGB was a HELL of a lot more efficient.

BUSHCO hasn't had a successful hit since MLK and Bobby. Because they get rank amateurs/friends of Neil's to do it.

[Barrett808]

29. But I thought Yushchenko was the US pick, complete with taxpayer funding

Or am I off track?

[bhikkhu]

33. The CIA may favor one side, the Pentagon another,

this has happened many times, while the pres. remains strategically neutral.

[BiggJawn]

50. There's no logic to it that I can see. Another reason I say BUSHCO.

Maybe Poppy got a wild hair up his ass or something...

Of course, you understand that this is all tinfoil-hatting of the highest degree, don't you?

[Tandalayo_Scheisskopf]

16. Ricin?

Attacks the liver. Perhaps.

[Rene]

19. Didn't the British recently say that Arafat was slowly poisoned

and Castro's first fall off the stairs was bizarre; he walked like in a trance, straight off the top stair---and he's fallen again. It's my opinion that bushco and/or mossad is getting poison into him also.
Aristide of Haiti should consider himself lucky that he was just removed by bushco and not assasinated or something.

[Tacos al Carbon]

21. No, the British never said that

And Castro is an old man. Old men fall.

[Zynx]

34. Ricin would have killed him

Even an extremely small amount will kill you for sure. This was something else.

[Elidor]

18. I hate to say this

But his face has more character now. More expressiveness. I wouldn't wish this on anyone (outside of Bushco), but I like his face better now. He looks somehow heroic.

[montana_hazeleyes]

22. Please tell me

you are not serious .

[hlthe2b]

23. "Battle-Scarred" literally. But he was a good looking man. Sad.

And, yes, i wonder what systemic damage has been done.

[NNN0LHI]

25. Should have used mice for food testers like Bush does

There is no excuse for not taking common sense precautions.

Don

[R Hickey]

58. Bush doesn't use mice for food testers, he uses rats.

Rats are a species more closely related to neocons.

[daleo]

64. But would he want to harm a relative? n/t

[henslee]

28. It was PARLOCK. But seriously, can he regain his vigor/health/looks?...

What is his prognosis for recovery?!

[Jack_DeLeon]

30. Thats so fucking horrible....

I dont think I would wish that on anybody.

I can imagine a few people who I think deserve to die, but not to be poisoned and disfigued for maybe the rest of thier lives.

[Must_B_Free]

37. suspicious article

I believe he was poisoned, but my friend is a skeptic. If I show him this article, he'll point outthat they claim to know for sure what happened, but can't identify if it was chemical, biological or a rare poison (and wouldn't that be chemical or biological)?

Seems scant on any proof. Just a doctor making a claim with detailing any sort of proof or reasoning.

[maddezmom]

52. Dr. Michael Zimpfer, the Rudolfinerhaus director & Korpan denies claim

Doctors are still running tests to try to determine what caused the illness, said Dr. Michael Zimpfer, the Rudolfinerhaus director.


"We are meticulously investigating that, and we are running entirely new tests in different labs, but there is no evidence so far," he said.


Zimpfer rejected as "entirely untrue" a story in the Wednesday edition of the London daily The Times, which quoted Dr. Nikolai Korpan — the Rudolfinerhaus physician who oversaw Yushchenko's treatment — as saying that Yushchenko had been poisoned and the intention was to kill the candidate.


Korpan also was quoted as denying making the remarks.


"The suspicion of poisoning has until now neither been confirmed or excluded," Korpan said, according to the Austria Press Agency. He could not be reached for further comment.

http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&cid=518&ncid=732&e=10&u=/ap/20041208/ap_on_re_eu/austria_yushchenko

[LisaL]

59. Exactly. How stupid do they think people are?

According to this article, Drs. say they know he was deliberately poisoned, but have no clue what agent was used. Well, HTF can they say he was poisoned if they haven't got a clue what poisoned him?
Had they identified this agent as something that doesn't occur in nature, then, or course, one would surmise he was poisoned. Otherwise, it's complete bullshit.

[American Tragedy]

39. It sounds like vintage KGB

Not to imply anything, of course.

[Briar]

60. or vintage Murdoch press misreporting n/t

[daleo]

40. I will believe it when it has been verified by neutral physicians

Peer review and all that. Until then, I just can't believe anything that would benefit Bush in international power struggles, as this surely would, seeing as how it would rally anti-Russian forces in Ukraine. Beyond the considerations of Ukrainians themselves, this is most assuredly a power struggle between Russia and the U.S./U.K. axis.

The whole story reminds me too much of babies tossed out of incubators accounts. If the Russians really had the ability to use a poison like this on their political opponents, why has it only turned up now in this one case? Surely they have had more important international leaders to poison over the past half century.

I suspect this story will never really get any verification (the patient won't be able to spare the time for another test) before the election is over. Thus, I would categorize it as part of the propaganda in the current political struggle.

[neweurope]

45. I agree absolutely.

I'm certain it was to give him that "cripple-bonus".

Terible times when you can't believe anything at all anymore. When somebody says "good morning" one has to look out of the window to make sure for oneself...

[maddezmom]

55. Korban is now quoted as denying the remark

Zimpfer rejected as "entirely untrue" a story in the Wednesday edition of the London daily The Times, which quoted Dr. Nikolai Korpan — the Rudolfinerhaus physician who oversaw Yushchenko's treatment — as saying that Yushchenko had been poisoned and the intention was to kill the candidate.


Korpan also was quoted as denying making the remarks.


"The suspicion of poisoning has until now neither been confirmed or excluded," Korpan said, according to the Austria Press Agency. He could not be reached for further comment.

http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&cid=518&ncid=732&e=10&u=/ap/20041208/ap_on_re_eu/austria_yushchenko

[LisaL]

57. Of course.

That article is crap. Unless they identify what that "substance" was, HTF could they know if it was administered deliberately or if it was administered at all?

[daleo]

63. Simply amazing - they made it up?

I had some doubts about the source. I guess the fact that The Telegraph lost in the Galloway libel suit hasn't changed the right wing media's disposition to just making facts up as they go along.

[dbt]

49. Bush The Elder.

Let him prove he didn't do it!

:evilgrin:
dbt

[LisaL]

56. I am sorry, but that sounds like crap.

They did not identify the "substance", but are sure it was administered deliberatly?
LOL.

[bin.dare]

62. the Times has sunk so low ...

it is now a blatant lying mouthpiece for the right wing. YES, YES, Viktor Yushchenko is a rightwinger. He was fired from the Kuchma government for being too right wing. Don't get fooled by press coverage from the likes of the Times and all your own american news sources.