Prime suspect in Georgi Markov 'umbrella poison' murder tracked down to Austria - Telegraph Crime Prime suspect in Georgi Markov 'umbrella poison' murder tracked down to Austria Thirty four years on, the murder of Georgi Markov - the Bulgarian dissident poisoned by the tip of an umbrella in central London - remains one of the great unsolved mysteries of the Cold War. Georgi Markov Photo: REUTERS By Nick Holdsworth, in Moscow, and Robert Mendick, Chief Reporter 2:00PM GMT 23 Mar 2013 The writer, who was living in the capital, was assassinated on the orders of the Bulgarian secret service as he waited for a bus on Waterloo Bridge in September 1978. While his killers have never been found, a suspect in the case has emerged: a spy known in Bulgarian files as Agent Piccadilly. He was named in Bulgaria eight years ago as Francesco Gullino, a Danish national of Italian origin, who worked for the then Communist regime using his business as an antiques dealer as a cover. Mr Gullino’s whereabouts have remained unknown.

But finally he has been tracked down to an obscure Austrian town where he has admitted working for the Bulgarian secret service, Darzhavna Sigurnost (DS), but denied any involvement in Mr Markov’s murder. Now that he has been located, Scotland Yard, whose file on the Markov murder remains open, are likely to want to question Mr Gullino. Related Articles Spy drama recalls umbrella poisoning 20 Nov 2006 Now in his 60s, he was traced to his home by a film-maker for a new documentary, entitled: Silenced: Georgi Markov and The Umbrella Murder. In it, Mr Gullino, asked if he was still in touch with his old Bulgarian secret service handler, replied: “Yes I know him, but this is an intimate question because I was really in that [secret service] branch.” He was then challenged about his role in the assassination, to which Mr Gullino responded: “I have got nothing to do with this story. "I’m sorry, I wish I could give you a straight answer but… but think for a moment: If I was, if I were the murderer, you think I should, I just say it?

You know my theory about the truth.” Mr Gullino earns his money as an antiques dealer with a supplementary income from the Danish state pension. But around 1978, he was paid thousands of pounds by the Bulgarian secret service. Between then and the collapse of Communism in 1990, he received a total of £30,000 from the DS, according to official files. It is alleged that Mr Gullino was ordered by the DS to live in Copenhagen in 1978 - the year Mr Markov was murdered - and set up an antiques business as a cover. The assassination of Mr Markov, a constant thorn in the side of Bulgaria’s Communist regime, was one of the most chilling episodes of the Cold War. He had lived in political exile in London since the late 1960s and was married to Annabel Markova, a novelist who writes under the name Annabel Dilke. The couple had a daughter Alexandra, who was just two when her father, then aged 49, was killed.

Mrs Markova,70, said in the documentary: “I wish, that, when people talk about it in the west, they wouldn't say ‘Oh the guy, that got stuck by an umbrella’, they'd say ‘oh the great writer’, you know. The writer was so brave, that he risked his life to tell the truth, this would be fantastic.” Mr Markov, who worked for the BBC, was standing on Waterloo Bridge when he felt a sharp pain in thigh. He thought little of it but three days later he was dead. The killer had stabbed him with an umbrella, which had injected under his skin a pellet containing the poison ricin. Mr Gullino was outed as a suspect by a Bulgarian journalist who had spent six years combing the archives of Bulgaria’s secret service. It was claimed in 2005 that Mr Gullino had entered Britain, driving an Austrian-registered caravan, having been sent to London to 'neutralise’ Mr Markov on the direct orders of the country’s then hardline ruler Todor Zhikov.

Working under the codename Agent Piccadilly, it is alleged that Mr Gullino helped to arrange the assassination before leaving London the day after to travel to Rome, where he met his handler. In 1993, Mr Gullino was detained in Denmark after a tip off by MI6 and held for questioning for 11 hours by Danish intelligence services before being released due to a lack of evidence. Klaus Dexel, the investigative journalist who tracked down the suspect, said: “Gullino received £30,000 from the DS between 1978 and 1990 and was frequently invited to security service events in Bulgaria. I think that means he had an important role in this murder but there is no evidence he was trained to be a killer, trained in the 'wet arts’. He is, however, a very well trained liar and able to cover his trail.” Mr Dexel believes another Bulgarian agent, nicknamed The Woodpecker, flew into London the day before the killing and flew out the day after. “This Woodpecker could have been the murderer, or been used to carry the murder weapon in, or indeed Gullino may have played that role,” Mr Dexel said.

The documentary-makers traced Mr Gullino after months of research in Sofia, Copenhagen, and Budapest – another city with which Mr Gullino has long been associated. He was eventually tracked down to Wels, a town in northern Austria about a two-hour drive from Vienna. City records show that Gullino has a tenancy on a shabby apartment block there. The two-storey building, situated in a part of the small Austrian town that houses antique yards and warehouses, is a warren of small apartments and corridors. Mr Markov’s friend and colleague Dimitar Botchev, 68, told The Sunday Telegraph that to see the key suspect in the murder living happily on an Danish state pension in a pretty little town in Austria left him feeling sickened and angry. He said: “There is plenty of evidence against Gullino; it is clear that his hands are not clean. There is sufficient evidence that he was involved in some way in the murder of Markov. But not a finger has been raised against him. “Georgi Markov was my best friend.

It is very painful that all these years after his death, with all the facts and evidence, we are no closer to solving his murder.” Sources at Scotland Yard said it was aware of Mr Gullino. A spokeswoman said: “We can confirm that the inquiry remains open and has been a particularly complex investigation. “We continue to work with the appropriate international authorities to investigate any new information that is passed or made available to police.” It is thought UK detectives last travelled to Bulgaria about 12 months ago in the hunt for Mr Markov’s killer. Files from the time were largely destroyed making the search more difficult. Mr Gullino’s role as a DS agent was revealed after the collapse of the Bulgarian communist regime in 1989, when a file was found containing false passports in his name, his agreement work under the codename Piccadilly, as well as receipts for thousands of pounds in cash, dating to the period around September 1978. The file was one of few to have escaped destruction when the DS incinerated nearly all its files as the Communist regime fell apart. The film suggests the assassination involved a team of up to five agents, including the driver of a London cab that Scotland Yard was never able to trace.

It also suggests that the KGB were involved in supplying the poison and draws parallels between Mr Markov’s murder and that of former KGB officer Alexander Litvinenko, who died in London in November 2006 after drinking tea laced with radioactive polonium-210. Poison-tip umbrella assassination of Georgi Markov reinvestigated - Telegraph News Poison-tip umbrella assassination of Georgi Markov reinvestigated The cold war murder of Georgi Markov, the Bulgarian dissident who was assassinated using a poison-tipped umbrella, is being reinvestigated by Scotland Yard. By Richard Edwards, Crime Correspondent 7:54PM BST 19 Jun 2008 Counter-terrorism detectives spent two weeks in Bulgaria last month, applying to interview 40 witnesses and to access archived documents on the case - one of Britain's most famous unsolved murders which resembles the plot of a spy novel.

Markov had been classified as a "non person" On a September evening in London in 1978, Markov, a prize-winning Bulgarian author and BBC broadcaster who had been classified as a "non person" by the communist authorities, was waiting alongside commuters for a bus on Waterloo Bridge when he felt a stinging pain in his thigh. A heavily built stranger dropped an umbrella, mumbled "sorry" and fled in a taxi. Markov thought little of the seemingly trivial incident and continued his journey home; he was dead of a high fever in three days and was later buried in Dorset. The James Bond-style murder weapon was an umbrella, partly developed by the Soviet KGB, which fired a pellet the size of a pinhead, containing the poison ricin. Related Articles Bulgaria to close Georgy Markov 'umbrella killing' case 09 Sep 2013 Three years ago a book citing leaked Bulgarian intelligence documents named the alleged hitman as Francesco Giullino, a Dane of Italian origin who worked for the Bulgarian secret service. He is described as agent "Piccadilly" who worked for the communist era Durzhavna Sigornost (DS), the Bulgarian equivalent of the KGB.

One intelligence report said of him: "He does not feel fear." Files allegedly show the DS sent Giullino, now 62, on three trips to London in 1977 and 1978 to "neutralise" Markov, who was a persistent critic of the regime in radio broadcasts for the BBC Bulgarian service. The DS files appear to confirm that he was the only agent in London at the time of the killing. The nearest Giullino came to facing justice was on February 5, 1993, when he was interrogated in Copenhagen for six hours by British and Danish detectives after a tip-off linking him to the case. He admitted espionage but denied any involvement in the Markov killing. He was not held, because Denmark had no case against him. Scotland Yard has kept an open file on the notorious killing but have stepped up a review of the case in the past two years. A squad of detectives from the counter terrorism command flew to Bulgaria last month, in March and in April last year. But officers face a race against time.

The present Bulgarian government intends to wash its hands of the case on September 11, 2008, by invoking its legal code's statute of limitations, which closes the book on all unsolved, or unpunished, crimes after 30 years. Andrey Tsvetanov, the Bulgarian investigator in charge of the case, said: "We are fully cooperating with our colleagues and are having a 100 percent exchange of information on both sides - something we lacked in the past. "We can now talk about a real investigation and analysis of the case. I hope that our collaboration will help exhaust all case scenarios," he added. Detectives want to question two former top secret police officers: Vladimir Todorov, who served a 10-month jail term in 1992 for allowing the destruction of some secret archives on the case, and Lyuben Gotsev. A spokeswoman for Scotland Yard said: "Can confirm that a small team of MPS officers travelled to Bulgaria in May 2008 icw the inquiry into the death of Georgi Markov in 1978.

This inquiry remains open and has been a particularly complex investigation." Poison umbrella murder case is reopened | The Independent Poison umbrella murder case is reopened Thursday 19 June 2008 23:00 BST Click to follow The Independent Online One theory says the KGB and Bulgarian secret service ordered the assassination of the playwright Georgi Markov in London PA Scotland Yard detectives have flown to Bulgaria in a fresh attempt to shed light on one of the murkiest and most controversial episodes in the secret history of the Cold War. A team of senior police officers travelled to Sofia last month, it emerged yesterday, as part of the investigation into the unsolved murder of the Bulgarian dissident Georgi Markov, who was stabbed with a poisoned umbrella while walking across London's Waterloo Bridge in 1978. The author and playwright, who defected to the West in 1969, was an outspoken critic of the communist regime in his home country and worked as a journalist for the BBC World Service in London. It is believed he had survived two previous assassination attempts. He died in hospital four days after the third attempt. A post-mortem examination revealed traces of ricin in a pin-sized metal pellet imbedded in the writer's calf.

According to Bulgaria's Dnevnik newspaper yesterday, counter-terrorism investigators from the UK have requested archive documents on the case, as well as seeking permission to interview 40 witnesses including the former secret police chief Vladimir Todorov, who served a 10-month jail term in 1992 for destroying files relating to the case. Scotland Yard confirmed that a small team had visited the former Iron Curtain country. "This inquiry remains open and has been a particularly complex investigation. We continue to work with the appropriate international authorities to investigate any new information that is passed or made available to police," a spokesman said. Up to five officers spent two weeks in Bulgaria last month, having only visited the country a few weeks before, in March. British police had also flown to the country in April 2007 seeking access to secret documents. The Bulgarian investigator in charge of the case, Andrey Tsvetanov, told the newspaper: "We are fully co-operating with our colleagues and are having a 100 per cent exchange of information on both sides – something we lacked in the past. We can now talk about a real investigation and analysis of the case.

I hope that our collaboration will help exhaust all case scenarios." The sudden enthusiasm in Sofia will surprise observers of the case, who had assumed it was effectively closed in 2000. But fresh impetus may have come as the 30-year statute of limitations in Bulgaria expires in September. Despite the failure to prosecute anyone, there has been no shortage of theories, claims and counter-claims over the years. In 1990, the Russian-British double agent Oleg Gordievski claimed that the KGB had supplied the poison and developed the complex delivery system. He also said that the murder itself was carried out by Bulgarian secret agents. The claim was given further credence two years later when another former Soviet spy, Oleg Kalugin, claimed Bulgaria's former communist dictator Todor Zhikov had personally ordered the assassination. Ten days before Markov's death, another Bulgarian defector, Vladimir Kostov, was attacked in a similar way in the Paris Metro, though this time the assailant was carrying a small bag rather than an umbrella. In his case, the ricin failed to be released. Markov, who was 49 when he died, was rehabilitated after the collapse of communism in 1990.

In 2000 he was awarded the Order of Stara Planina, Bulgaria's highest honour, for his services to literature and his opposition to communism. More about: Close We've noticed that you are using an ad blocker. Advertising helps fund our journalism and keep it truly independent. It helps to build our international editorial team, from war correspondents to investigative reporters, commentators to critics. Click here to view instructions on how to disable your ad blocker, and help us to keep providing you with free-thinking journalism - for free. Thank you for your support. How to disable your ad blocker for independent.co.uk Adblock / Adblock Plus Click the Adblock/Adblock Plus icon, which is to the right of your address bar. On Adblock click "Don't run on pages on this domain". On Adblock Plus click "Enabled on this site" to disable ad blocking for the current website you are on. If you are in Firefox click "disable on independent.co.uk". Firefox Tracking Protection If you are Private Browsing in Firefox, "Tracking Protection" may cause the adblock notice to show. It can be temporarily disabled by clicking the "shield" icon in the address bar.

Ghostery In versions before 6.0 click "whitelist site". In version 6.0 click "trust site" or add independent.co.uk to your Trusted Site list. In versions before 6.0 you will see the message "Site is whitelisted". Click "reload the page to see your changes". uBlock Click the uBlock icon. Then click the big power button to whitelist the current web site, and its state will be remembered next time you visit the web site. Then reload the page. Thank you for supporting independent.co.uk Continue to our site Prime Suspect in Georgi Markov 'Umbrella Poison' Murder Tracked Down to Austria - Novinite.com - Sofia News Agency Prime Suspect in Georgi Markov 'Umbrella Poison' Murder Tracked Down to Austria Views on BG | March 24, 2013, Sunday // 14:30| Views: 2542 | Comments: 0 Send to Kindle Georgi Markov was murdered with a ricin-coated pellet, fired from an adapted pen; an umbrella was dropped nearby to distract him.

File photo Thirty four years on, the murder of Georgi Markov - the Bulgarian dissident poisoned by the tip of an umbrella in central London - remains one of the great unsolved mysteries of the Cold War. The writer, who was living in the capital, was assassinated on the orders of the Bulgarian secret service as he waited for a bus on Waterloo Bridge in September 1978. While his killers have never been found, a suspect in the case has emerged: a spy known in Bulgarian files as Agent Piccadilly. He was named in Bulgaria eight years ago as Francesco Gullino, a Danish national of Italian origin, who worked for the then Communist regime using his business as an antiques dealer as a cover. Mr Gullino’s whereabouts have remained unknown. But finally he has been tracked down to an obscure Austrian town where he has admitted working for the Bulgarian secret service, Darzhavna Sigurnost (DS), but denied any involvement in Mr Markov’s murder. Now that he has been located, Scotland Yard, whose file on the Markov murder remains open, are likely to want to question Mr Gullino.

Now in his 60s, he was traced to his home by a film-maker for a new documentary, entitled: Silenced: Georgi Markov and The Umbrella Murder. In it, Mr Gullino, asked if he was still in touch with his old Bulgarian secret service handler, replied: “Yes I know him, but this is an intimate question because I was really in that [secret service] branch.” He was then challenged about his role in the assassination, to which Mr Gullino responded: “I have got nothing to do with this story. "I’m sorry, I wish I could give you a straight answer but… but think for a moment: If I was, if I were the murderer, you think I should, I just say it? You know my theory about the truth.” Mr Gullino earns his money as an antiques dealer with a supplementary income from the Danish state pension. But around 1978, he was paid thousands of pounds by the Bulgarian secret service. Between then and the collapse of Communism in 1990, he received a total of ?30,000 from the DS, according to official files.

It is alleged that Mr Gullino was ordered by the DS to live in Copenhagen in 1978 - the year Mr Markov was murdered - and set up an antiques business as a cover. The assassination of Mr Markov, a constant thorn in the side of Bulgaria’s Communist regime, was one of the most chilling episodes of the Cold War. He had lived in political exile in London since the late 1960s and was married to Annabel Markova, a novelist who writes under the name Annabel Dilke. The couple had a daughter Alexandra, who was just two when her father, then aged 49, was killed. Mrs Markova,70, said in the documentary: “I wish, that, when people talk about it in the west, they wouldn't say ‘Oh the guy, that got stuck by an umbrella’, they'd say ‘oh the great writer’, you know. The writer was so brave, that he risked his life to tell the truth, this would be fantastic.” Mr Markov, who worked for the BBC, was standing on Waterloo Bridge when he felt a sharp pain in thigh. He thought little of it but three days later he was dead.

The killer had stabbed him with an umbrella, which had injected under his skin a pellet containing the poison ricin. Mr Gullino was outed as a suspect by a Bulgarian journalist who had spent six years combing the archives of Bulgaria’s secret service. It was claimed in 2005 that Mr Gullino had entered Britain, driving an Austrian-registered caravan, having been sent to London to 'neutralise’ Mr Markov on the direct orders of the country’s then hardline ruler Todor Zhikov. Working under the codename Agent Piccadilly, it is alleged that Mr Gullino helped to arrange the assassination before leaving London the day after to travel to Rome, where he met his handler. In 1993, Mr Gullino was detained in Denmark after a tip off by MI6 and held for questioning for 11 hours by Danish intelligence services before being released due to a lack of evidence. Klaus Dexel, the investigative journalist who tracked down the suspect, said: “Gullino received ?30,000 from the DS between 1978 and 1990 and was frequently invited to security service events in Bulgaria.

I think that means he had an important role in this murder but there is no evidence he was trained to be a killer, trained in the 'wet arts’. He is, however, a very well trained liar and able to cover his trail.” Mr Dexel believes another Bulgarian agent, nicknamed The Woodpecker, flew into London the day before the killing and flew out the day after. “This Woodpecker could have been the murderer, or been used to carry the murder weapon in, or indeed Gullino may have played that role,” Mr Dexel said. The documentary-makers traced Mr Gullino after months of research in Sofia, Copenhagen, and Budapest – another city with which Mr Gullino has long been associated. He was eventually tracked down to Wels, a town in northern Austria about a two-hour drive from Vienna. City records show that Gullino has a tenancy on a shabby apartment block there. The two-storey building, situated in a part of the small Austrian town that houses antique yards and warehouses, is a warren of small apartments and corridors.

Mr Markov’s friend and colleague Dimitar Botchev, 68, told The Sunday Telegraph that to see the key suspect in the murder living happily on an Danish state pension in a pretty little town in Austria left him feeling sickened and angry. He said: “There is plenty of evidence against Gullino; it is clear that his hands are not clean. There is sufficient evidence that he was involved in some way in the murder of Markov. But not a finger has been raised against him. “Georgi Markov was my best friend. It is very painful that all these years after his death, with all the facts and evidence, we are no closer to solving his murder.” Sources at Scotland Yard said it was aware of Mr Gullino. A spokeswoman said: “We can confirm that the inquiry remains open and has been a particularly complex investigation. “We continue to work with the appropriate international authorities to investigate any new information that is passed or made available to police.” It is thought UK detectives last travelled to Bulgaria about 12 months ago in the hunt for Mr Markov’s killer. Files from the time were largely destroyed making the search more difficult.

Mr Gullino’s role as a DS agent was revealed after the collapse of the Bulgarian communist regime in 1989, when a file was found containing false passports in his name, his agreement work under the codename Piccadilly, as well as receipts for thousands of pounds in cash, dating to the period around September 1978. The file was one of few to have escaped destruction when the DS incinerated nearly all its files as the Communist regime fell apart. The film suggests the assassination involved a team of up to five agents, including the driver of a London cab that Scotland Yard was never able to trace. It also suggests that the KGB were involved in supplying the poison and draws parallels between Mr Markov’s murder and that of former KGB officer Alexander Litvinenko, who died in London in November 2006 after drinking tea laced with radioactive polonium-210. CNN.com - Ricin and the umbrella murder - Oct.

23, 2003 Ricin and the umbrella murder Markov was hit by the dart after walking across Waterloo Bridge Story Tools  Ricin as a weapon LONDON, England -- It was one of the most notorious acts of assassination carried out during the Cold War. Bulgarian dissident Georgi Markov was killed by poison dart filled with ricin and fired from an umbrella in London in 1978. Markov, a communist defector working for the BBC World Service, left his office at Bush House in the UK capital on September 11 and walked across Waterloo Bridge to take the train home to Clapham in south-west London. As he waited at a bus stop moments into his journey home, he felt a sharp jab in his thigh and saw a man picking up an umbrella. He developed a high temperature and in four days was dead. A post mortem, conducted with the help of scientists from the UK government's germ warfare centre at Porton Down, established that he had been killed by a tiny pellet containing a 0.2 milligram dose of the poison ricin. Markov's assassination was detected only because the pellet carrying the poison had not dissolved as expected.

His assassin has never been captured despite close cooperation between British and Bulgarian authorities, including Interpol. Markov, a playwright and satirist who had broadcast scathing accounts of Communist high life to Bulgaria, was the subject of two failed assassination attempts before he was killed. And in the years following his death efforts were made to reveal the chain of command which led to the order for his assassination being given. KGB suspected in assassination It is believed that the operation was supported by the technical staff of the Soviet KGB and seems to have involved many senior members of the Bulgarian secret police. In June 1992 General Vladimir Todorov, the former intelligence chief, was sentenced to 16 months in jail for destroying 10 volumes of material on the case. A second suspect, General Stoyan Savov, the deputy interior minister, committed suicide rather than face trial for destroying the files. Another Bulgarian spy, Vasil Kotsev, who was widely believed to have been the operational commander of the Markov assassination plot, died in an unexplained car accident. Scotland Yard says the case remains open.

Extracted from the seeds of the castor bean plant Ricinus communis, ricin is one of the most feared substances with the potential to be used as a bio-terror agent or weapon of mass destruction. It is widely available, easy to produce, and a tiny amount is enough to kill an adult. Story Tools The Curious Case of the Poisoned Umbrella: The Murder of Georgi Markov « The View East The Curious Case of the Poisoned Umbrella: The Murder of Georgi Markov This week marks 33 years since the murder of Bulgarian dissident Georgi Markov, who was poisoned in London on 7 September 1978. Markov’s assassination, an operation conducted by the Bulgarian Secret Services (the Darzhavna Sigurnost or DS) under the guidance of the Soviet KGB, contained all the essential ingredients of a Cold War spy thriller: mystery, intrigue, nameless, faceless assassins and a nifty James Bond style gadget used as a murder weapon.

Markov’s murder also led to widespread outrage and concern – after all, he was killed in the centre of London, in broad daylight, during rush hour, by communist secret agents who appeared to be able to kill with impunity, before vanishing into thin air … Georgi Markov Georgi Markov, author, broadcaster and communist-era dissident, who was murdered in extraordinary circumstances in London on 7 September 1978. Born in Sofia in 1929, Georgi Markov studied industrial chemistry at university in the 1940s, before working as a chemical engineer and technical school teacher. However, Markov’s true love was literature and he went on to become an acclaimed novelist, playwright and TV script writer. Many of his works were critical of communist Bulgaria – Markov had described his novel ‘The Great Roof’ as ‘a symbol of the roof of lies … that the communist regime has constructed over Bulgaria’ – and as a result, were often prohibited from publication.

In 1969 Markov left Bulgaria for the West, travelling first to Italy before settling in Londonin the 1970s, where he learned English and worked as a broadcaster and journalist for the Bulgarian section of the BBC World Service, Deutsche Welle and Radio Free Europe. Several of Markov’s novels were published and his plays were performed to critical acclaim in the UK during the 1970s. Markov’s defection to the West meant that he quickly became persona non grata back in Bulgaria. In 1972 his membership in the Union of Bulgarian Writers was suspended and he was sentenced (in absentia) to a six year prison sentence for his defection. Markov’s previously published works were withdrawn from libraries and bookshops and his name was not permitted to be mentioned in the official Bulgarian media until 1989. Even from afar however, Markov proved a continuing thorn in the side of the Bulgarian Communist Party, criticising the regime in radio broadcasts for the BBC Bulgarian service. Between 1975 and 1978 Markov worked on a series of ‘In Absentia’ reports – analysis of life in Communist Bulgaria, broadcast weekly on Radio Free Europe.

His continued criticism of the Communist government and personal attacks against party leader, Todor Zhivkov, made Markov an enemy of the regime. A recently declassified letter, sent from the DS to the KGB in 1975 complained that Markov’s radio broadcasts ‘insolently mocked’ the communist party, and ‘encouraged dissidence’ in Bulgaria. The DS kept a surveillance file on Markov using the code name ‘Wanderer’ and whilst in London he received several death threats via telephone. Markov’s publisher, David Farrer, later said that ‘he (Markov) knew his activities made him a possible target for assassination’. The Case of the Poisoned Umbrella. On the morning of 7 September 1978, Georgi Markov was on his way to work at the BBC. While waiting at a bus stop near Waterloo bridge alongside several other commuters, he felt a sudden, sharp pain on the back of his right thigh, which he later described as ‘similar to an insect bite’.

A nearby man (described as ‘heavy set with a foreign accent’) then briefly stooped to pick up an umbrella from the ground and mumbled ‘I’m sorry’, before hurriedly crossing the street and jumping into a taxi. Upon closer examination after he arrived at work, Markov discovered a small, painful red bump on the back of his leg. Over the course of the working day he became progressively sicker and was admitted to hospital that evening, suffering from a high fever. He died a few days later, on 11 September. Georgi Markov had been poisoned by a small pellet fired into his leg on that fateful morning. During the subsequent autopsy, forensic pathologists discovered a spherical metal pellet the size of a pin-head embedded in his leg, containing holes drilled at right angles to each other, to form an “X” shaped well inside the pellet. The pellet had been filled with 0.2mg of the deadly poison Ricin and then covered with a waxy coating that was designed to melt at 37 degrees celsius (the temperature of the human body), thus triggering the release of the poison into the bloodstream.

Suspicion that a specially designed ‘umbrella-gun’ had been used as the murder weapon led to Markov’s assassination being dubbed ‘The case of the poisoned umbrella’. Diagrams were even produced to demonstrate how the umbrella may have been adapted into a lethal killing machine with a ‘poisoned tip’, and former KGB officers have since claimed that such a device had indeed been designed. However, subsequent theories have suggested that the poisonous pellet may have been directly injected by hypodermic needle or fired into Markov’s leg by a specially adapted pen, with the umbrella being dropped nearby as a distraction. Following the autopsy, the coroners’ ruling determined that Markov had been ‘unlawfully killed’. Diagram depicting the small metal pellet found embedded in Georgi Markov's leg after his death. Diagram depicting the 'umbrella-gun' that many people believe was used to fire the poisoned pellet into Georgi Markov's leg while he stood waiting for a London bus. The Murder. Evidence suggests that Markov’s assassination was ordered from the highest levels, with the full knowledge and involvement of both the Bulgarian DS and the Soviet KGB.

Prior to the events of 7 September 1978, the DS had sought advice from the KGB about how best to ‘neutralise’ Markov, and two previous attempts had been made on his life: a toxin slipped into his drink at a dinner party and a previous attempt on his life during a visit to Sardinia, both of which had failed. It has been suggested that the date chosen for the third assassination attempt – 7 September – was because this was Zhivkov’s birthday, and Markov’s murder was to act as some sort of ‘gift’ to the Bulgarian leader. Recently declassified Bulgarian Secret Service files have confirmed the close nature of the relationship between the DS and KGB, although KGB representatives were keen to ensure there was no ‘trail’ directly linking Markov’s death toMoscow. However, the files show that two high-level Bulgarian secret-service delegations visited Moscow in the months leading up to the murder, where the dynamics of the Markov case were specifically discussed with technical experts from KGB laboratories.

According to the files, an Italian-born, Dane Francesco Gullino, codenamed ‘Piccadilly’, was recruited by the DS to act as the assassin, with records also documenting training and a series of payments made to ‘Picadilly’. Even today, mystery and controversy still surround Markov’s death. In 2010 TIME Magazine listed Markov’s murder as one of their ‘Top 10 Assassination Plots’ and in 1998, Bulgarian President Peter Stoyanov, described the assassination as ‘one of the darkest moments’ in communist Bulgaria. No charges have ever been bought though, despite renewed interest in the case in the post-Cold War period. In September 2008 a team of counter-terrorism experts from Scotland Yard travelled to Bulgaria to access archived documents on the Markov case.

Much of the evidence has been destroyed however, leading to accusations of a Bulgarian cover up – in 1992 General Vladimir Todorov, former Bulgarian intelligence chief, was sentenced to 16 months in jail for destroying 10 volumes of material relating to Markov’s death while two other individuals suspected of involvement in the assassination both died in mysterious circumstances in the 1990s – and Bulgarian prosecutors have now officially closed the investigation, under legislation which allows unsolved criminal cases to be dropped after 30 years. Interestingly, ten days before Markov’s murder, a similar assassination attempt was made on another Bulgarian exile, Vladimir Kostov, while he was waiting at a Paris metro station. Like Markov, Kostov came down with a high fever and was hospitalized, where Doctors found the same kind of metal pellet embedded in his skin.

On this occasion however, Kostov survived: possibly because he had not been shot at point blank range; possibly because the coating on the pellet had failed to fully dissolve, meaning that only a small quantity of Ricin was able to enter his blood or possibly because he was wearing a thick sweater on the day of the attack, which may have provided enough resistance to prevent the pellet completely penetrating his skin. However, Kostov’s case suggests that the attack on Markov may not have been an isolated case, but was perhaps intended as part of a wider strategy aimed at ‘silencing’ troublesome dissidents overseas. In the post-Cold War era, numerous cases including the dioxin poisoning of Ukrainian opposition leader (and later President) Viktor Yushchenko in the run-up to the 2004 elections; the still unsolved October 2006 murder of Russian journalist and human rights activist Anna Politkovskaya and the November 2006 death of former KGB and FSB officer Alexander Litvinenko from radiation poisoning after exposure to polonium in London have drawn fresh comparisons with the Markov case, suggesting that when it comes to politically-motivated assassination, old communist-era habits may be hard to break.

(For a more detailed overview of recent cases suspected of involving politically motivated poisoning, see THIS Open Democracy article by Zygmunt Dzieciolowski). Exploding Chocolate, Poisoned Scuba Suits, & The Bulgarian Umbrella: A Survey of Strange Assassination Tech Exploding Chocolate, Poisoned Scuba Suits, & The Bulgarian Umbrella: A Survey of Strange Assassination Tech Alexis Madrigal Pin it Share A newly revealed plot to kill Churchill with exploding chocolate prompts an investigation into history's weirder ways to assassinate. castropong.jpg More This is a young Castro playing ping pong shirtless. No known assassination attempts involved ping pong, oddly (AP). "Dear Fish, I wonder if you could do a drawing for me of an explosive slab of chocolate," begins a letter from Lord Victor Rothschild, a British intelligence officer in World War II. "We have received information that the enemy are using pound slabs of chocolate which are made of steel with a very thin covering of real chocolate. Inside there is high explosive and some form of delay mechanism." The letter, which was sent on May 4, 1943 to Laurence Fish, an illustrator, referenced a very real assassination plot by the Nazis.

Their target: no less than the round mound of resolve, Prime Minister Winston Churchill. The chocolates were to be placed "amongst other luxury items in the War Cabinet's dining room where Winston Churchill often hung out." But the plan was discovered by British spies and (ahem) foiled. This exploding-chocolate story has just come to light this week in the British papers, and it got me thinking. Could this be the most bizarre assassination technology? Surely not. So I went looking for some more. Hitler himself was almost done in by an exploding briefcase planted not by a spy, but by a member of his military during a coup attempt. His press secretary said of the attack, "The German people must consider the failure of the attempt on Hitler's life as a sign that Hitler will complete his tasks under the protection of a divine power." But perhaps the best place to look was the annals of the Central Intelligence Agency. As detailed in the Church Committee report of the 1970s, the agency was constantly plotting to kill the leaders of countries that it perceived too anti-American or pro-communist. In grinding detail, the reports reconstruct the various CIA efforts, none of which appear to have succeeded.

On the very plausible sounding end of the spectrum, there was the plot to kill the first Congolese Prime Minister, Patrice Lumumba . A CIA agent procured simply picked a biological agent from a list of substances available the Army Chemical Corps at Fort Detrick, Maryland, and stuck it in a bottle along with gloves and a syringe. The idea was to get the substance onto some kind of food or perhaps into his toothpaste, which Lumumba would have eaten, and thereby contracting the illness. Among the candidate diseases were: tularemia ("rabbit fever"), brucellosis (undulant fever), tuberculosis, anthrax, smallpox, and Venezuelan equine encephalitis ("sleeping sickness"). And then there are the attempts to kill Fidel Castro, which were detailed in a book, The Fish Is Red, as well as a British documentary called, " 638 Ways to Kill Fidel Castro ." Still, I prefer the Church Report's droll retellings of the plots.

First, there were the poison cigars: A notation in the records of the Operations Division, CIA's Office of Medical Services, indicates that on August 16, 1960, an official was given a box of Castro's favorite cigars with instructions to treat them with lethal poison. The cigars were contaminated with a botulinum toxin so potent t,hat a person would die after putting one in his mouth. The official reported that the cigars were ready on October 7, 1960 ; TSD notes indicate that they were delivered to an unidentified person on February 13,196l. The record does not disclose whether an attempt was made to pass the cigars to Castro. Then, we read about the poison pills, an alternative to a "gangland-style killing," in that the method was "nice and clean, without getting into any kind of out and out ambushing." The pills contained botulinum toxin and were manufactured to dissolve in water, so they could be dropped into Castro's drink. They were given to a shady underworld figure with Las Vegas contacts, who apparently somehow got them to someone in the Castro government, but nothing came of the plot.

The CIA seemed to perceive that Castro was vulnerable near or in the ocean. In 1963, they seriously examined "whether an exotic seashell, rigged to explode, could be deposited in an area where Castro commonly went skin diving." Basically, an EXPLODING CONCH SHELL. And they explored giving him a diving suit that been "dusted.. with a fungus that would produce a chronic skin disease (Madura foot), and contaminated the breathing apparatus with a tubercule bacillus." Apparently, the CIA's tech folks bought the suit and did the contamination, but it never left the lab. And who could forget the poison pen, "a ball-point pen rigged with a hypodermic needle" filled with Blackleaf-40 poison? Apparently, it was kind of a kludgey assassination device, though. The CIA contact in Cuba who was given the pen, "did not 'think much of the device,' and complained that CIA could surely 'come up with something more sophisticated than that.'" Of course, the Soviets had their share of assassination technologies, too. One is so famous it even has a name, "The Bulgarian Umbrella," and a Wikipedia page.

Quoth the people's encylopedia: The Bulgarian umbrella is the name of an umbrella with a hidden pneumatic mechanism which shot out a small poisonous pellet containing ricin . The Bulgarian Umbrella has a hollow stalk which the pellet neatly sits into. Such an umbrella was allegedly used in the assassination of the Bulgarian dissident writer Georgi Markov on September 7, 1978 (the birthday of the Bulgarian State Council Chairman Todor Zhivkov who had often been the target of Georgi Markov's criticism), on Waterloo Bridge in London (Markov died four days later), and also allegedly used in the failed assassination attempt against the Bulgarian dissident journalist Vladimir Kostov the same year in the Paris Métro . The poison used in both cases was ricin . The Israeli intelligence services are suspected of killing Yehiya Ayyash with his own cellphone, which the group had rigged as a bomb. The History Channel dramatized how easy it is to turn a cellphone into a bomb . As one retired Shin Bet officer put it, "Half the battery can be dynamite." Yikes. In recent years, the world witnessed the truly horrifying assassination of former KGB agent turned journalist, Alexander Litvinenko, in London.

A rare radioactive isotope polonium-210 was placed in his tea during a lunch at a sushi restaurant. He fell ill and died a slow death from the radiation poisoning. Several Russian officers have been suspected of the killing. Of course, most assassinations don't come through fanciful cloak-and-dagger activity. Without the complexities of the Cold War to deal with, drones do most of the covert killing. At least for the United States. (Thanks to @gbrumfiel, @haleyhennes, @jodyavirgnan, and @monbud for their help with this story.) More From The Atlantic Georgi Markov: Bulgaria inaugurates statue to dissident - BBC News BBC News Georgi Markov: Bulgaria inaugurates statue to dissident 11 November 2014 Image copyright AFP Image caption Markov had longed to return to his native Bulgaria A statue has been inaugurated in Bulgaria to the dissident playwright Georgi Markov, who was assassinated in London in 1978. Markov, who worked at the BBC World Service, was poisoned, apparently on the orders of Bulgaria's then communist authorities.

A pellet containing a toxin was fired into his leg on Waterloo Bridge, possibly from an umbrella. The statue was unveiled by President Rosen Plevneliev. Speaking at the ceremony in Journalist Square in central Sofia, Mr Plevneliev said: "The words of Georgi Markov spiritually liberated the Bulgarians even before the toppling of the communist regime." Those who attended the ceremony included Markov's widow Annabel, who spoke of how he her late husband had longed to go back to Bulgaria. Image copyright AFP Image caption Markov's widow Annabel was among those attending the unveiling He has now returned to Bulgaria "as a permanent part of the landscape of Sofia", she said. Markov was waiting for a bus on Waterloo Bridge when he felt a sharp jab in the leg and saw a man nearby dropping an umbrella. After developing a fever, he died five days later in hospital on 11 September, aged 49. The pellet, possibly containing ricin, is thought to have been fired either from the umbrella or a pen into his thigh. The killing is assumed to have been carried out on the orders of the Bulgarian secret service, possibly with help from the Soviet KGB, to silence his radio broadcasts.

But investigations have failed to prove this conclusively. The Bulgarian authorities closed their investigation into the incident last year and a British police inquiry remains officially open. No-one has been formally accused of the killing, but Bulgarian police files which came to light spoke of an agent codenamed "Piccadilly". Markov went into exile in 1969 and became an outspoken critic of the Bulgarian communist government of the time. The incident is one of the most notorious of the Cold War, which saw communist Russia and the United States face each other across a divided Europe in a state of deep mutual suspicion.

Question: Which Bulgarian dissident was poisoned on Waterloo Bridge in 1978, with an umbrella into which had been inserted a pellet containing ricin?
Answer: GEORGI MARKOV