Viktor Bout wonders why the US wants him so badly

After the surprise court ruling in Bangkok last Tuesday when the United States was denied the extradition of Viktor Bout, the man they have dubbed the Merchant of Death flashed a "V" for victory sign as he was led in leg irons and an orange prison suit from the Criminal Court.

The once burly 42-year-old Russian military officer, visibly thinner after 17 months in detention at Bangkok's maximum-security Klong Prem prison, was nonetheless beaming at the thought of escaping the reach of the US justice system.

For the Americans, who trumpeted his arrest at the Sofitel hotel on Silom Road on March 6 last year following an international sting operation involving dozens of US undercover drug agents, it was a bitter blow. After all, Bout was the man the US wanted the most after Osama bin-Laden, accused of supplying arms and logistics for bloody conflicts in Africa, Eastern Europe and Afghanistan.

See also: US to oppose bail for Bout

Despite his denials of wrongdoing, Bout is on a number of international most-wanted lists, the subject of UN sanctions and an Interpol notice over weapons trafficking. The US has also frozen his assets.

''We're disappointed and mystified by the lower court ruling,'' said James Entwistle, deputy chief of mission at the US embassy immediately after the decision.

Prosecutors announced on Friday that they had launched an appeal against the extradition ruling, which could see Bout held in custody for a further three months to three years. But Bout's lawyer Lak Nitiwatanavichan was confident the appeal would be rejected, saying they would use the same defence. ''They have no case,'' he said.

But for Viktor Bout, a man who has repeatedly claimed he is nothing more than a businessman, it's also a case of ''V'' for vendetta by his American pursuers.

''These accusations made by the Americans are totally ridiculous and without foundation,'' he said. ''In fact, it is very hard to do it [arms trafficking]. The missiles are not available, even from the Russian Army. This is crazy. It is someone's imagination only.''

In a series of exclusive interviews with Spectrum conducted inside the prison visiting area over recent weeks, Bout spoke bluntly of his rage at a friend of 20 years who he said betrayed him to US law enforcement officers and fears that he would be assassinated inside the jail.

His arguments about the case go some way to explaining why the final act of the US sting operation failed in Thai jurisdiction. A senior police officer told Spectrum US law enforcement agencies had chosen Thailand over other Asian destinations because the local constabulary was seen as compliant.

Further complicating the case was the pressure placed on Thailand at the diplomatic level by its traditional ally, the United States, and a re-emergent post-Cold War Russia. ''We view this decision with satisfaction, and we hope that in the nearest future, Viktor Bout will return to the motherland,'' Interfax quoted a Russian foreign ministry spokesman as saying.

Bout's wife Alla was far more circumspect. ''We have won the battle, but not the war yet,'' she said.

But Bout was never confident about victory. When Spectrum spoke to him in prison he was clearly agitated and angry and already planning an appeal against the decision which he felt would go against him.

''If I lose the appeal and I am sent to America, maybe they will put me in Guantanamo prison,'' Bout said only days before the verdict.'' I am afraid of being extradited to the US and to end there.

''The Americans claim that they want to close it, but in reality it is still open.''

Six-foot tall and with a military background, Bout said he had not been harmed while in detention as ''I can defend myself'' and ''I don't behave in such a way that someone could attack me''.

However, he did express concern for his future safety after rumours circulated at the prison that he would be murdered. When asked if he was concerned, he said: ''You bet I am. I am afraid that I will be killed. Maybe someone will poison the food or I will get hurt another way. Also, I am afraid that I won't live too long if I am extradited to jail in the United States.''

At the time of his arrest, US prosecutors said the capture of Bout was the result of a long-term sting operation led by undercover US drug agents posing as members of the Colombian rebel group Farc, which the US categorises as a terrorist organisation. Michael Garcia, the US attorney for the Southern District of New York, alleged that it was the final stage of ''arranging the sale of millions of dollars of high-powered weapons to people he believed represent a known terrorist organisation, the Farc''.

The US Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) led the sting operation, which started in November 2007 and centred on an unidentified paid informer described only as ''CS-1,'' for confidential source No1. After the arrest, the federal prosecutors said they would seek the extradition of Bout and an associate, Andrew Smulian, a 68-year-old British passport holder, who was also arrested at the Sofitel.

The New York Times reported that a criminal complaint unsealed in Manhattan showed the Bout assignation in Thailand had taken shape after earlier meetings, most of them conducted by Smulian, with informants posing as members of Farc, in the Netherlands Antilles, located off the coast of Venezuela, Denmark, and Romania.

The informer sent email messages to Bout through Smulian asking for a meeting about a possible deal, referring to Bout as ''Boris'' and weapons as ''farming equipment''

It is here that the details of the American ''sting'' operation start to become shaky. While the US was requesting the extradition of Bout and Smulian, it emerged in a report on March 12 that Smulian had already appeared in a Magistrates court in Manhattan and been charged.

This coincides with confusion in Bangkok over how many of the alleged arms dealers were in custody; there can only be one answer, either Smulian was an informant or had agreed to testify against Bout.

When asked by Spectrum why he did not leave the Sofitel after the undercover US agents said they were from Farc and started to talk about weapons, Bout replied: ''Because Andrew and I have known each other for over 20 years.

''Andrew Smulian told me that he has a client who wants to buy two cargo aircraft from me,'' Bout said. ''When he called me we always discussed the sale of airplanes. That's why I came to Bangkok. But once we were inside the business centre of the Sofitel hotel ... he introduced me to two crazy guys who started to talk some bullshit things _ left and right, this and that. They acted like clowns, with the meeting going nowhere.''

Bout says they ''started to provoke'' him ''It was not my business and I was not dealing with that or had anything to do with it. At that moment they arrested me,'' he said.

According to the US grand jury charges, at the Bangkok meeting Bout indicated he could supply Farc with 700-800 surface-to-air missiles, 5,000 AK-47 firearms, three million rounds of ammunition, an unspecified number of land mines and C-4 explosives and ultralight planes fitted with grenade-launchers and missiles.

Bout also stated he could arrange an airdrop of the arms to Farc in Colombia, and drew a diagram for two of the ''confidential sources'' (CS-2 and CS-3) to explain the delivery route, according to the charges. He also produced a map of South America and asked them to identify US radar locations in Colombia.

The charges also say Bout offered to sell Farc two cargo planes and added he needed ''at least 15 to 20 million'', no currency specified, to begin supplying the arms.

But Bout told Spectrum that no evidence was produced during the extradition hearing to back up the allegations. Exhibits the American legal team produced included pictures of two cargo planes and Bout's alleged notes during the meeting (more correctly, scribbled numbers, letters and doodles ) with apparent references to weapons and aircraft.

''They said that I had written something about the weapons, but where is it? Anyone can write 'AK' or whatever else on this piece of paper and call it evidence. They didn't put it in the report or produce it as evidence after I was arrested. Where is it? The Americans said there is a map. Where is it? Where is the evidence? Do they need over one year sitting on the evidence and not submitting it together with other documents of arrest and detention? How come? What do the Americans want from me?''

Bout says Smulian was also arrested at the hotel's business centre, but they were later separated at the Crime Suppression Division. Bout's bodyguard, Mikhail Belozerskiy, who arrived with him from Moscow in the morning and didn't join the meeting, was also detained in another section of the business centre, but later released. This is confirmed by court documents seen by Spectrum.

The confidence the US had in the success of the undercover operation is borne out in a letter from their embassy to the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and the Thai government dated February 29, 2008. It requests the ''provisional arrest for the purpose of extradition'' of both Bout and Smulian as a matter of urgency.

''I am in jail because of Andrew Smulian,'' Bout said from prison. ''He was my friend and I don't understand why he joined with the Americans against me and for what reason he set me up. Most probably it was for money.''

But, there was a major flaw in the US extradition case, according to Judge Jittakorn Wattanasin, who ruled last Tuesday that while America may view Farc as a terrorist organisation, Thailand does not.

''The US charges are not applicable under Thai law. This is a political case,'' the judge said while reading his verdict. ''The Farc is fighting for a political cause and is not a criminal gang. Thailand does not recognise the Farc as a terrorist group. We will not extradite him to the United States.''

In response to reports on the day of the arrest that US officials tried to force him on a plane, Bout said ''no, this didn't happen, nor was I taken to the airport. The Americans tried to convince me a few times to go to the United States voluntarily''.

Bout's claims to legitimacy and an ordinary life as a businessman differ vastly from the repeated allegations made against him as a weapons dealer to dubious regimes, most notably in the book Merchant of Death by Douglas Farah and Stephen Braun.

Bout says he moved to the United Arab Emirates in 1993 where he opened an air freight company. At the end of 2000 local security agents told him to close the company and leave the country within four days without giving a reason. Bout said he complied and this was effectively the end of his air-freight business.

After returning to Russia, Bout said he had nothing to do except sell his planes, which he did not own 100%. He said he was living quietly in Moscow with his wife Alla and daughter Elizabeth, spending most of his time at home reading books and watching TV. Alla Bout was running a fashion design shop which ''didn't do badly'' and they had enough money to live on.

Bout said after 9/11, the Western media started a new campaign against him, accusing him of various wrongdoings. Alla Bout said the reports were reprinted in the Russian media without verification. Bout says he maintained his silence until October 2001 when, after the accusations piled up, he decided to be interviewed on a Russian television channel, Echo, during which he strongly denied the allegations. Even after the interview Russian law enforcement agencies did not accuse him of any wrongdoing, he said.

Bout says he spent most of the time living in Moscow, with the exception of a few trips to some states in the former Soviet Union. His only trips ''abroad'' after returning to Moscow were a family holiday to China in 2000, a visit to Montenegro in 2005 or 2006 and the 2008 trip to Bangkok, Alla Bout said.

Bout becomes incensed at the suggestion he supplied weapons to Farc or other terrorist organisations.

''No, I didn't. Never! This is all bullshit,'' he says. ''Everything is in the Americans' minds. They don't know what to do anymore in the world. During the past eight years the Western media didn't want even to talk to me because they knew that they would have problems.''

Bout is particularly angry about the 2005 film Lord of War starring Nicolas Cage as Yuri Orlov, which is allegedly based on his life story and details the gruesome trade of weapons-trafficking in Africa.

''The movie is pure fiction, fantasy and fabrication which has nothing to do with me or my previous business. The movie didn't make much money either. I used to admire actor Cage, but not anymore.''

However, when asked if his air-freight company shipped arms before it went out of business, he replied: ''Some cargo shipped by my air-freight company included weapons, but it doesn't mean that I am an arms dealer.''

When asked if he was involved in air freighting goods for America's war in Iraq after 2003, he said ''I can categorically state that I have never shipped anything to Iraq as reported by the BBC and other news organisations, nor did anything for the Americans there whatsoever.''

He added: ''I must condemn reputable news organisations such as the British Broadcasting Commission, the Cable News Network and other Western media for totally distorting the facts about my past activities. I would describe most of what they say about me as lies and fabrications.''

When asked why the Americans wanted him so badly, Bout became visibly angered at suggestions there may be other reasons behind their pursuit of him or that he may be privy to embarrassing information that is trying to be kept secret.

''I don't know any secrets!'' he said. ''Why do they need me so badly? Why did they want so badly to be in Iraq? Why did they need so badly to be in Afghanistan. Why do they need so badly to keep Guantanamo detainees? Why do they bring them there and not to American soil? They commit one crime and try to cover it by committing another crime. They cannot stop. Once you start a lie, you need to lie thousand times more.''

Since his incarceration, Bout said he had ''enough help'' from the Russian consular staff in Bangkok. ''They come here regularly. They are doing a lot of liaison with my family and helping me with the legal things as much as possible. They are also helping me to prepare the appeal and supporting me morally.''

He also said that he had heard Russia's Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov had raised his case with Thai officials when he was here for the Asean meeting last month, but added he did not know what was said.

Other article in this serie: BOUT CASE RAISES TENSIONS BETWEEN THE US AND RUSSIA