Listyev was shot in the entrance to his apartment building as he returned from work. The killing sparked an outpouring of public mourning. Despite repeated promises, investigators have failed to solve the case.
The two former agents told Parlamentskaya Gazeta they had guessed Listyev was the target of a hit by piecing together public information. "We didn't have any concrete evidence, only logical conclusions," one of the former agents said. "We would have been laughed at [if we had informed the police]." The agents said they warned Listyev through a colleague at ORT television.
The agents were identified only as colonels with law degrees. Their names and the name of their agency were not given.
In the interview, they said they believed Boris Berezovsky was behind Listyev's murder.
Numerous reports over the years have linked Berezovsky with the murder. He denies involvement and has never been charged.
An Interior Ministry spokes-man said Wednesday the Prosecutor General's Office recently handed over the names of several suspects in the case. The identities would not be made public, he said.
Shortly before he was killed, Listyev had been named to head the newly privatized ORT and had begun working on plans to overhaul its advertising structure. He had announced a moratorium on airing commercials while he reorganized the highly lucrative business. Berezovsky, an ORT board member, and his associate Sergei Lisovsky, whose advertising agency had a monopoly on ORT, had much to lose from the moratorium.
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