Convicted Russian arms dealer Viktor Bout, who has been sentenced to 25 years in a U.S. jail, said on Thursday he believed that the Russian authorities would manage to arrange his return to his home country.
“I believe that if Russia gets to the bottom of what happened and makes a confident and strong statement, I will come home very quickly,” he said, speaking by phone from his Brooklyn cell during a video link with his wife between New York and Moscow organized by RIA Novosti.
A U.S. court found Bout guilty of conspiring to kill U.S. citizens and sell arms to Colombian militants. He maintains his innocence.
Russia and the United States have both signed the European Convention on the Transfer of Sentenced Persons, which allows a person sentenced for a crime in a foreign country to be transferred to serve his sentence back in his homeland. “So Bout’s repatriation is possible,” Russia’s Justice Ministry said on Friday.
