Saturday 8 October 2022

Are the broadcasters stepping up their exposure of Russia?

 Channel 5 has renewed interest in the unexplained 2010 death of GCHQ employee Gareth Williams. Several contributors to the documentary asserted that Russia was involved directly or indirectly in what must have been an ingenious murder. The Russia theme dominated, to the detriment of the programme in my opinion. The personality of Williams himself was lost. What filled the gap between his schooldays, so movingly described by a former teacher, and his acceptance by GCHQ? There were several shots of Williams in cycling gear. If he was a competitive cyclist, why did we not hear from team-mates and rivals? Were the fashion items in his cupboards for personal use or the kernel of a canny collection? And how did he make the financial leap from being a lodger in suburbia to a well-appointed flat in central London?  Even for a mathematical genius, civil service pay is surely not that generous.

Last week, on radio, there was another revival. Radio 4 reran Oliver Bullough's five-part examination of how London came to be the conduit of choice for dirty money, largely (though not exclusively) money stolen from the Russian people by the men styled oligarchs. 

It could be just coincidence that these subjects were taken off the shelf as the Johnson administration, so closely identified with Russian capital, was ousted by Liz Truss's government, dominated by other interests. One must await the third coincidence.



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