Russian ex-spy's condition worsens

LONDON: The health of former Russian spy and Kremlin critic Alexander Litvinenko has got much worse, friends said on Wednesday after seeing him in hospital, where he is in critical condition after being poisoned.

Doctors and police are still investigating how exactly Litvinenko, 43, fell ill. He is in intensive care under police guard having become sick shortly after reportedly being warned he was a potential target.

Speaking outside London's University College Hospital (UCH), his friend Alex Goldfarb told reporters that Litvinenko's condition had got much worse.

"He is very tired, he is not really communicating, he is aware and alert but...the light is irritating to him, he's much thinner and I would say he is yellowish."

"I would say that he has deteriorated much since yesterday," he added.

Another friend of Litvinenko, filmmaker Andrei Nekrasov, visited him alongside Goldfarb and said he was "absolutely shocked" by his appearance.

"I saw him just a month ago as a healthy, cheerful man full of energy and thirst for life and he looks like a ghost and it's very, very upsetting," he said.

Doctors treating Litvinenko are still attempting to pinpoint exactly what happened to him.

University College Hospital (UCH), where the former Federal Security Service (FSB) lieutenant-colonel has been taken, said on Tuesday that thallium poisoning, initially thought to be the cause of his condition, was "unlikely".