US unhappy with Thai court's ruling on alleged arms dealer

      Check your foreign currency exchange rates against the Thai Baht with Bangkok Bank.

Check out Pattaya/Bangkok Shipping & Transport services

Bout escapes extradition to US

Writer: SURASAK GLAHANPublished: 12/08/2009 at 12:00 AMNewspaper section: News

A Bangkok court has dismissed a US request to extradite Russian arms trader Viktor Bout.The court yesterday ruled the charges against him were political and not punishable by Thai law.US officials said they were "disappointed" by the verdict. Thai prosecutors are considering an appeal. The Bangkok Criminal Court court ordered Mr Bout be released by Friday afternoon if Thai prosecutors had not lodged an appeal by that time. Mr Bout, 42, rushed to hug his tearful wife in the courtroom after Judge Jittakorn Pattanasiri read the verdict clearing him of terrorism charges. "I can't talk. There are so many emotions. I was very worried," wife Alla said.

Portrayed by the media as "the Merchant of Death" for his arms trading, Mr Bout was arrested in a Bangkok hotel in March last year in a sting operation. Agents from the US Drugs Enforcement Agency posed as rebels from the leftist Revolutionary Armed Forces of Columbia (Farc) seeking to buy millions of dollars in arms, including surface-to-air missiles, from Mr Bout. The US officials alleged Mr Bout's agreement to sell arms to Farc was tantamount to an act of terrorism, as the weapons would be used by the rebels to kill US citizens and destroy US property in Columbia.

The US made its extradition request to the Thai government based on the argument that Mr Bout was involved in a terrorist conspiracy to target the US. Farc is proscribed as a foreign terrorist organisation under US law. But Mr Bout denied the arms trafficking charges, saying he worked in the aviation and construction industries. The court yesterday dismissed US claims that Farc would use the weapons to kill US citizens and destroy its property due to a lack of evidence.

The court said, based on statements by prosecution witnesses, Farc's aim was to overthrow the Columbian government. As such their violent actions were considered political, as was Mr Bout's alleged support of Farc.

Bout was arrested by a bunch of American DEA agents though never accused of any drug crimes anywhere. So we have the DEA acting as world police & being a Policeman in Thailand with not so much of actual crimes but of morals. USA is, after all, the world’s biggest arms merchant and has a long history of selling to both sides. They can’t stand competition?

BUT WHATS THE DIFFERENCE WITH RUSSIAN VICTOR BOUT AND THE USA SUPPLYING ARMS TO MANY DICTATORS & ROGUES.

Canada's defence industry accounts for 650 firms, and 57,000 direct jobs, while the Canadian Defence Industries Association puts the figure at 1,559 firms. CDIA employment numbers roughly match those of the CCC. The Canadian defence industry sells about $5 billion dollars of goods and services per year, half of which are exported so maybe they export to whoever????.

A U.S. dealer who has grown rich moving arms for governments is Sarkis Soghanalian, president of United Industries, with branches in Miami, Beirut, Madrid, Athens, Geneva, and Baghdad. Sitting in his office atop a private hangar at Miami International Airport, Soghanalian claims his sales exceed $1 billion a year, with profits at 10%. He has a stable of Arabian horses, homes in Athens, Madrid, and Paris, as well as Miami, and a fleet of jets and helicopters to whisk him and his weapons anywhere at a moment's notice. Could he be the world's biggest arms merchant? Soghanalian a Lebanese worked for the CIA as a client and his fortunes turned.

German-born Ernst Werner Glatt, a man who used to buy weapons for USA CIA man Cummings in East Germany. Colleagues say Glatt got rich supplying the CIA with East bloc weapons for Afghanistan and the contras. Glatt with about $200 million a year in steady business and a multimillion-dollar Virginia farm called Black Eagle.

David Duncan, an elusive character who other dealers say peddled guns for the CIA out of South Florida. Duncan made the headlines when the Panamanian government seized a ship, the Pia Vesta, laden with 1,500 Kalashnikov rifles and 1,500 Soviet antitank rockets belonging to him. Duncan said at the time that the cargo, initially bound for Peru, was rerouted to Panama and was to have been flown from there to El Salvador. The true identity of the intended recipients has never become public. Duncan also runs an aircraft company that carries nonmilitary supplies and weapons to the contras. Says a veteran dealer: ''He's one of the CIA's pipsqueak smugglers.''

Sam Cummings, 59, an amiable, American-born British citizen and former CIA agent. Cummings learned his trade traveling around Europe after World War II buying stashes of surplus weapons for the CIA. In 1953 he went into business for himself, buying arms from both the East and West blocs and reselling them for whatever the market would bear. Cummings says he does about $80 million a year in sales from offices in Virginia, England, and a penthouse in Monte Carlo that is just steps from the onetime home of Sir Basil Zaharoff, an infamous turn-of-the-century arms dealer. LIKE MOST arms merchants, Cummings says he would sell to almost anyone if the government allowed it.

The most notorious weapons merchant is Saudi Arabian Adnan Khashoggi, a mastermind behind the U.S. arms sales to Iran. Source: http://money.cnn.com