West Horsley (United Kingdom) (AFP)

"Polonium, polonium", sings a choir in medical gowns.

In the UK, the murder of ex-Russian spy Alexander Litvinenko has become an opera, which is being performed for the first time on Thursday.

Alexandre Litvinenko, exiled in the United Kingdom and become an opponent of the Kremlin, died on November 23, 2006 following poisoning with polonium-210, an extremely toxic radioactive substance.

While he was dying, he pointed the finger at the responsibility of Russian President Vladimir Putin.

Inspired by its history, British composer Anthony Bolton's opera "Life and Death of Alexander Litvinenko" will be performed from Thursday at the Grange Park Opera Festival in Surrey, south-west London.

After being pushed back for a year due to restrictions linked to the coronavirus pandemic, the first representation is sold out.

It was by reading a biography of the former agent of the Russian intelligence services (FSB, ex-KGB) written by his widow Marina and his friend Alex Goldfarb, that Anthony Bolton decided to embark on this opera which has required three years of work.

The composer told AFP that he was "very moved" by the suffering of Litvinenko, who died after his body was "eaten from the inside" by the poison.

Love, tragedy, betrayal ... his story "had all the ingredients to make an opera," Bolton said.

Marina Litvinenko, 59, said she was overwhelmed by this work.

"It's very moving because I don't just see my story, I listen to the music and it provokes very strong feelings. It takes me back to my life (...) and I'm really happy that people see this which happened to us in 2006, "she told AFP.

- "Justice" -

The widow of Alexander Litvinenko sees in this opera a "form of justice", because it mentions the names of "the people who committed this crime, who killed my husband".

Ten years after the death of Litvinenko, an investigation carried out in the United Kingdom had concluded with the responsibility of the Russian state, which denies, in this poisoning and established the guilt of two executants, the Russians Andrei Lugovoy and Dmitri Kovtoun.

They had had tea with the victim at the Millenium Hotel in central London.

But attempts to extradite the two men were unsuccessful.

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Now a nationalist deputy, Lougovoi judged it "unlikely" to see the opera.

"The idea of ​​making an opera based on the + polonium scandal + is for me similar to the whole affair related to the death of Alexander Litvinenko: a well-staged show," he told the AFP.

And to add: "The fact that the British director sees me in the image of a + bad opera + will certainly not prevent me from sleeping".

Litvinenko's poisoning deteriorated diplomatic relations between London and Moscow, which deteriorated further with the Novichok poisoning of ex-Russian double agent Sergei Skripal and his daughter in Salisbury, southwestern Switzerland. 'England, in 2018.

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Litvinenko fell ill on November 1, 2006, and his condition rapidly deteriorated until his death on November 23.

In a posthumously published letter, he addressed Putin: "You have succeeded in silencing a man, but the howl of protest from all over the world will reverberate, Mr Putin, in your ears for the rest of your life. "

Litvinenko's story has already inspired a play called "A Very Expensive Poison" by Lucy Prebble, based on a book by the former correspondent of the British daily The Guardian in Moscow, Luke Harding. .

In "Life and Death of Alexander Litvinenko", the music borrows passages from Russian composers Rachmaninoff, Shostakovich and Tchaikovsky, but also from the songs of football and the Russian army, as well as from the Chechen anthem.

Among the highlights of the play, the staging recreates in this 700-seat opera the hostage-taking of a Moscow theater in October 2002 by a Chechen commando.

The 71-year-old composer told AFP he hoped viewers would be "moved" by Litvinenko's death and that his work "would bring the story of his life to life for a long time."

vid-pop-am-pau / cdu / cn

© 2021 AFP