LONDON — A senior British judge was set to open a frequently delayed public inquiry on Tuesday into the death of Alexander V. Litvinenko, a former K.G.B. officer, whistle-blower and opponent of the Kremlin who was poisoned with a rare radioactive isotope, polonium 210, as he sipped tea in an upscale London hotel in November 2006.
The judge, Robert Owen, has indicated that the inquiry, the most detailed public scrutiny so far of the poisoning, could last about 10 weeks and would cover Mr. Litvinenko’s personal life before and after he fled Russia in 2000 to seek asylum with his family in London.
–
Russian prosecutors, who once held the status of so-called core participants at the inquiry, have withdrawn, and Moscow has ridiculed the hearings as a sham because of the levels of secrecy shrouding central witnesses and testimony.
