New York, NY, United States (AHN) – Viktor Bout, the alleged arms dealer to rebel groups worldwide, arrived in New York today to face trial after being extradited from Thailand.
Bout is accused of using his air cargo business as a front for arms sales and shipments that fueled civil wars in South America, the Middle East and Africa.
He was arrested in March 2008 at a luxury hotel in Bangkok after an undercover sting operation by U.S. agents posing as Colombian guerillas trying to buy guns.
Since then, he has been held in jail in Thailand during a legal and political tug-of-war between three countries.
The United States wants to put him on trial for terrorism charges.
Thai authorities were reluctant to release him for extradition until all their legal procedures were completed. A criminal court ruled shortly after Bout was arrested that extraditing him would be illegal under Thai law.
The deadlock was broken when Thailand Prime Minister Abhisit Vejjajiva intervened in favor of extradition and an appeals court overturned the lower court’s ruling.
Russia’s foreign ministry has protested repeatedly that the prosecution of Bout is politically motivated, rather than a criminal case.
“We have no doubt that the illegal extradition of Viktor Bout is a result of the unprecedented pressure the U.S. brought on the Thai government and legal system,” the Russian Foreign Ministry said in a statement.
Bout, 43, a former Soviet military translator, is believed to know sensitive intelligence information about the Russian government.
His previous role as a military officer has led to speculation that it is the real reason the Russians want him to be allowed to return to their country.
The 2005 movie “Lord of War” bears striking similarities to Bout’s exploits as an arms merchant.
A 2007 book about Bout, and a British politician who publicly criticized him, refer to him as the “Merchant of Death.”
Bout’s Web site describes him as a businessman who started his air cargo business about the time the Soviet Union collapsed in 1991. He denies arms smuggling and gunrunning accusations.
“This is an unequivocally political decision, lobbied for by the U.S. government,” Alla Bout, his wife, told Russia’s NTV television network Tuesday. “It has no legal basis whatsoever.”
However, the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration claims to have information that his customers have included Liberia’s Charles Taylor, Libya’s Moammar Gadhafi and military factions on both sides of Angola’s civil war. Taylor is on trial at the International Court of Justice at The Hague for crimes against humanity.
The DEA agents who did the undercover sting operation on Bout were posing as rebels from the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC), which is designated as a terrorist organization by the U.S. government and the European Union.
In addition, a 2000 United Nations report said, “…Bulgarian arms manufacturing companies had exported large quantities of different types of weapons between 1996 and 1998 on the basis of (forged) end-user certificates from Togo,” and that, “…with only one exception, the company Air Cess, owned by Victor Bout, was the main transporter of these weapons from Burgas airport in Bulgaria.”
The weapons appear to have been destined for one faction in Angola’s civil war of 1975-2002, according to the United Nations.
Bout was escorted under heavy guard to Bangkok’s Don Muang airport Tuesday, where a DEA airplane was waiting.
Bout claims he was framed by the DEA.
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