MOSCOW, January 26. /TASS/. Viktor Bout, a Russian national who was released from US captivity in December, said that American authorities tried to gather compromising information about senior Russian officials during interrogations, promising political asylum to his family in return.
"If I provided, as they (the American side - TASS) say in their slang, `dirt', on our leadership, then my family could be granted asylum. These proposals were made to Alla (Viktor Bout’s wife - TASS), too, when she first visited America," Bout said in an interview with Rossiya-1 television on Thursday.
Bout also said he had been warned that he would have "serve every second of his prison sentence, as an example to other Russians who dared to refuse to strike a deal with US justice," by failing to provide compromising information about the Russian leadership.
Bout was detained in Thailand’s capital of Bangkok in 2008 under a warrant issued by a local court at the behest of the US. He was charged with illegally supplying weapons to a rebel group known as the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia, which is designated as a terrorist organization by the US. Bout was extradited to the United States two years later. In April 2012, he was sentenced to 25 years in jail and slapped with a $15-million fine.
On December 8, Bout returned to Russia as a result of an agreement with the US to exchange him for American basketball player Brittney Griner.