Does Russia's spy service use licence to kill?

MOSCOW, Nov 21 (Reuters) From ice axes, to poisonous umbrella tips, deadly cups of tea and toxic sushi, Russia's spy service has often been the prime suspect in outlandish assassination attempts.

A renegade Russian spy now lies close to death in a London hospital after eating sushi or drinking tea laced with poison at a lunch with a contact who gave him information about the murder of a journalist critical of the Kremlin.

British police plan to investigate the poisoning of exiled agent Alexander Litvinenko, and Russia's spy network is once again under suspicion.

''The KGB (the Soviet Union's spy agency) did kill abroad and their people still populate the top of Russia's current spy network,'' said Mark Galeotti, a specialist in Russian security at Keele university in Britain.

''It's not a question of 'could they?' but 'would they and why?''' he told Reuters by telephone.

Russian security chiefs have denied that their operatives tried to kill Litvinenko and say they no longer see any need to liquidate Russia's ex-spies and critics abroad.

In 1978, a man at a London bus stop stabbed Bulgarian dissident journalist Georgi Markov in the thigh with the tip of an umbrella.

Three days later Markov was dead, killed by a poisonous pellet injected by the umbrella.

No one was ever charged with the murder but it has always been assumed that it was the work of the state security service of Bulgaria -- then a Soviet satellite -- aided by the KGB.

Less mystery surrounds the 1940 murder in Mexico of Leon Trotsky, a rival of Soviet leader Josef Stalin. A Soviet agent smashed his skull with an ice axe as he worked in his study.

After a slump in morale and a drop in funding in the post-communist 1990s, Russia's spy network has become more active abroad, Galeotti said.

''But it's not clear to see what they would gain (from the poisoning) except there may be value in showing that even a former officer in exile is not safe,'' he said.

Undesirable people closer to home are more at risk.

Ukrainian President Viktor Yushchenko's face was disfigured by what doctors said was dioxin poison after he dined with security service leaders, while campaigning in 2004 against a candidate backed by the political establishment and Moscow.

No one has been charged in connection with the incident.

Alexei Mukhin, director general of the Moscow-based think tank Political Information Centre, said the Kremlin has no motive to assassinate its former spies.

''Putin's position is strong enough and he doesn't need to solve problems in such a way,'' he said. ''There is no political need for that.'' And Russia's Foreign Intelligence Service (SVR) said they no longer killed people.

''Starting from 1959, when the Ukrainian nationalist Bandera was eliminated, the Soviet intelligence service and the successor of the KGB's First Directorate, the Foreign Intelligence Service, have not carried out work to physically liquidate people disagreeable to Russia,'' SVR spokesman Sergei Ivanov told Ekho Moskvy radio station.

Stepan Bandera was found bleeding and barely alive at the entrance of his Munich home. He later died and a Soviet agent was imprisoned for poisoning him.

REUTERS SB VV0927