A Thai court delayed reputed Russian arms smuggler Viktor Bout’s extradition hearing to the US for a second time after his new defense attorney failed to show up for the high-profile case yesterday.
Bout, dubbed “The Merchant of Death,” has been indicted in the US on four terrorism charges. Though he denies any involvement in illicit activities, he is regarded as one of the world’s most-wanted arms traffickers and was purportedly the model for the arms dealer portrayed by Nicolas Cage in the 2005 movie Lord of War.
Barefoot and shackled, Bout was led into Bangkok’s Criminal Court for a hearing that ended abruptly because his defense lawyer, whose name was not immediately available, was not present.
PHOTO: EPA
The lawyer “says he has another case. The court deems that it is necessary to postpone,” Judge Jitakorn Patanasiri told the court.
The judge initially set the new date as Aug. 22 but then corrected himself to say Sept. 22.
Prosecutor Vipon Kititasnaisornchai agreed to the postponement after the court showed him a formal request filed by a representative of the defense lawyer.
“The newly appointed lawyer has another case scheduled at the same time,” Vipon told the court, adding he “preferred not to postpone the case but the circumstance was beyond [the defense lawyer’s] capacity.”
On June 9, the first hearing was delayed for because Bout’s other attorney, Lak Nitiwatanavichan, said he had heart problems.
Lak, who is now serving as a legal adviser in the case, said Bout plans to fight the extradition.
“He’s innocent. There are no grounds for his extradition,” the lawyer said.
The 41-year-old Russian faces charges of conspiring to kill Americans, conspiring to kill US officers or employees, conspiring to provide material support to terrorists and conspiring to acquire and use an anti-aircraft missile, a US indictment made public on May 6 stated. He faces a life sentence.
US prosecutors say Bout was offering a deadly arsenal of weapons to the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC), including more than 700 surface-to-air missiles, thousands of guns, high-tech helicopters, and airplanes outfitted with grenade launchers and missiles. The US classifies FARC as a terrorist organization.
The charges were based in part on a covertly recorded meeting in Thailand on March 6.
Bout was arrested after a sting operation in which undercover US agents posed as Colombian rebels.
Bout, who has been accused of breaking several UN arms embargoes, has a long list of alleged clients including African dictators and warlords such as former Liberian president Charles Taylor and both sides of the civil war in Angola.
An American scientist convicted of lying to US authorities about payments from China while he was at Harvard University has rebuilt his research lab in Shenzhen, China, to pursue technology the Chinese government has identified as a national priority: embedding electronics into the human brain. Charles Lieber, 67, is among the world’s leading researchers in brain-computer interfaces. The technology has shown promise in treating conditions such as amyotrophic lateral sclerosis and restoring movement in paralyzed people. It also has potential military applications: Scientists at the Chinese People’s Liberation Army have investigated brain interfaces as a way to engineer super soldiers by boosting
Jailed media entrepreneur Jimmy Lai (黎智英) has been awarded Deutsche Welle’s (DW) freedom of speech award for his contribution to Hong Kong’s pro-democracy movement. The German public broadcaster on Thursday said Lai would be presented in absentia with the 12th iteration of the award on June 23 at the DW Global Media Forum in Bonn. Deutsche Welle director-general Barbara Massing praised the 78-year-old founder of the now-shuttered news outlet Apple Daily for standing “unwaveringly for press freedom in Hong Kong at great personal risk.” “With Apple Daily, he gave journalists a platform for free reporting and a voice to the democracy movement in
PHILIPPINE COMMITTEE: The head of the committee that made the decision said: ‘If there is nothing to hide, there is no reason to hide, there is no reason to obstruct’ A Philippine congressional committee on Wednesday ruled that there was “probable cause” to impeach Philippine Vice President Sara Duterte after hearing allegations of unexplained wealth, misuse of state funds and threats to have the president assassinated. The unanimous decision of the 53-member committee in the Philippine House of Representatives sends the two impeachment complaints to deliberations and voting by the entire lower chamber, which has more than 300 lawmakers. The complaints centered on Duterte’s alleged illegal use and mishandling of intelligence funds from the vice president’s office, and from her time as education secretary under Philippine President Ferdinand Marcos Jr. Duterte and the
As evening falls in Fiji’s capital, a steady stream of people approaches a makeshift clinic that is a first line of defense against one of the world’s fastest-growing HIV epidemics. In the South Pacific nation — a popular tourist destination of just under a million people — more than 2,000 new HIV cases were recorded last year, a 26 percent increase from 2024. The government has declared an HIV outbreak and described it as a national crisis. “It’s spreading like wildfire,” said Siteri Dinawai, 46, who came to be tested. The Moonlight Clinic, a converted minibus parked in a suburban cul-de-sac in Suva, is
RSS