Russia refuses British efforts to extradite murder suspect

“Our position has not changed,” Sergei Lavrov told reporters after his meeting with British counterpart David Miliband.

“I believe our British colleagues understand that demands that we essentially change our constitution are absolutely unrealistic.”

British police accuse sitting Russian lawmaker Andrei Lugovoi of murdering former Russian spy turned exiled Kremlin critic Alexander Litvinenko by lacing his tea with radioactive polonium in a London hotel on November 2, 2006. Russian authorities have insisted their constitution does not allow them to extradite Lugovoi, who was elected to parliament for a nationalist party in 2007.

Lavrov reiterated Russia's position that domestic authorities would try Lugovoi at home with the assistance from British officials if Britain provided sufficient evidence of his guilt.

Britain has so far failed to send a “full volume” of evidence on the case however, he said.

Lavrov stressed that resolving the long-running diplomatic dispute would significantly improve ties. “If there is concrete interest to sort out this matter then a path to this exists,” Lavrov said.

“If we did this, then we would remove a problem that is weighing down on our ties and could unlock a number of other limits which have been artificially introduced in our ties,” he said.

Miliband's visit to Moscow coincides with the third anniversary of Litvinenko's fatal poisoning in London, a crime that led to a serious degradation in ties.

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