By JIM HEINTZ
By JIM HEINTZ
Associated Press
NEW YORK — Russian authorities say they’ll pressure the U.S. government, including Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton, to send home an ex-Soviet officer known as the Merchant of Death after he was sentenced to 25 years in prison on terrorism charges.
The subject of 45-year-old Viktor Bout will be raised in talks with Clinton, Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov was quoted by the news agency ITAR-Tass as saying Friday in Astana, the capital of Kazakhstan.
“We are not being guided by a desire to take revenge but by the desire to ensure the observance and respect of the rights of our countryman,” Lavrov was quoted as saying. “We will actively support the appeal that Bout’s lawyers plan and in any case will secure his return to his homeland. We have legal instruments for this in relations with the United States.”
Separately, the Russian Foreign Ministry said in a statement: “The Russian Foreign Ministry is taking all necessary measures for the return of Viktor Bout to his homeland, using existing international legal mechanisms. This matter, without a doubt, will remain among our priorities in the Russian-American agenda.”