MOSCOW, August 28 (RIA Novosti) - Two Russians who allegedly met with Alexander Litvinenko on the day of his poisoning will field questions at a Wednesday news conference organized by RIA Novosti and a Moscow radio station.

The conference held for British journalists with Dmitry Kovtun and Andrei Lugovoi , Scotland Yard's key suspect in the murder of the former Russian security officer, will be broadcast live on Ekho Moskvy radio and via a webcast on rian.ru at 3 p.m. Moscow time (11 a.m. GMT) on August 29.

Moscow refused in early July to extradite Kremlin bodyguard-turned-businessman Lugovoi, which sparked a diplomatic dispute with London, involving tit-for-tat expulsions of diplomats and visa restrictions.

Litvinenko, an outspoken Kremlin critic, is believed to have died of poisoning from a dose of a highly toxic polonium isotope allegedly dropped into his drink at a luxury London hotel last November. Lugovoi reportedly met with him at the hotel on the day of his poisoning.

Lugovoi's business partner Dmitry Kovtun is also believed to have met Litvinenko hours before he fell ill on November 1 last year. In December German police announced that they had found radiactive traces in his car and apartment in Hamburg.