The US authorities have launched infamous Russian arms dealer-cum-amateur artist Viktor Bout in a dramatic prisoner swap for American basketball participant Brittney Griner, who was incarcerated in Russia for 10 months on drug smuggling fees. Bout served 12 years of a 25-year sentence. He was arrested in 2008 in Thailand after the US authorities accused him of conspiring to promote smuggled weapons to the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (aka FARC).
Instantly after touchdown in Moscow, Bout, 55, advised a reporter, “[The US authorities] merely woke me up in the course of the evening and stated ‘Get your issues collectively.’ There was no prior warning.”
The 2 prisoners had been filmed strolling previous one another on the tarmac of an airport within the United Arab Emirates on Thursday in the course of the trade. “On account of the efforts made, we managed to agree with the American facet on an trade of Viktor Bout for Brittney Griner. The Russian citizen has been returned to his homeland,” Russia’s overseas ministry stated.
US president Joe Biden had prioritised Griner’s launch after the 32-year-old two-time Olympic gold medalist was arrested in February for possession of hashish oil at a Moscow airport. She was sentenced to 9 years in a Russian penal colony. “I’m glad to say Brittney is in good spirits,” Biden stated on the White Home. “She’s on her manner dwelling after months of being unjustly detained in Russia, held beneath insupportable circumstances…She wants time and house to get better.”
In December 2021, Moscow’s Civic Chamber constructing exhibited 24 works Bout created behind bars, together with drawings and work made utilizing pencil, ballpoint pen, pastel, wax crayon, and oil paint. The present was curated by his spouse, Alla, who advised The Artwork Newspaper on the time, “TV channels are curious about Viktor’s case, they need to know what his life is like. There may be additionally lots of curiosity in his artwork, which he has spent the final six years creating. The exhibition proves that my husband has not misplaced coronary heart and continues to be inventive. His artwork is the one manner he can talk with the skin world.”
These current on the present had been optimistic about Bout’s prospect of launch, together with the chairman of Russia’s Civic Chamber Fee Alexander Vorontsov, who stated: “We’re gathered right here in the present day in order that the person who’s in an American jail is not going to resign himself to the destiny of America’s justice system… Viktor’s work are an expression of his soul and emotions, his striving for all times and perception that justice will prevail.”
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