Britain re-investigating umbrella killing

LONDON, June 20 (UPI) -- British police are taking a new look at one of their most notorious Cold War cases -- the 1978 killing of a Bulgarian dissident with a poisoned umbrella.

A group of senior detectives from the Metropolitan Police flew to Bulgaria last month to interview witnesses and examine documents in archives, The Independent reported. Dnevnik, a Bulgarian newspaper, reported that one of those they sought to interview was Vladimir Todorov, a former head of the Secret Police.

"This inquiry remains open and has been a particularly complex investigation," a police spokesman told The Independent. "We continue to work with the appropriate international authorities to investigate any new information that is passed or made available to police."

Georgi Markov, a Bulgarian writer who defected in 1969 and was working for the BBC World Service, died of ricin poisoning. Investigators claim a pellet containing ricin was implanted when he was stabbed with an umbrella four days earlier on Waterloo Bridge in London.

A book based on leaked Bulgarian documents said that the assassin was an Italian-born Dane working for Bulgarian intelligence who is now 62, The Telegraph said. The Independent suggested that the case has been reopened because Bulgarian law has a 30-year statute of limitations, which would expire in September.