Dubbed the "Merchant of Death", alleged Russian arms dealer Viktor Bout was thought to be one of the most prolific gun runners and sanction busters in the world. Following a manhunt that lasted for almost a decade, he was finally arrested in Bangkok in March 2008.  | The Man Who Armed The World Monday, 17 November, 2008 1900 GMT on BBC Two |
Tom Mangold reports for This World on the undercover operation to find Viktor Bout, masterminded by the US Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA). The sting was hatched on the Caribbean island of Curacao in the Dutch Antilles in January, with undercover agents posing as members of the Colombian rebel group Farc. Via clandestine meetings in Copenhagen and Bucharest, Mr Bout and his associates were bugged and followed until the dramatic climax in Thailand, where he was caught apparently conspiring to sell weapons to the US agents. On the eve of a crucial extradition hearing in Thailand, This World examines Mr Bout's extraordinary past. Thought to have links with the Russian military, Viktor Bout emerged after the collapse of Communism in the early 1990s as the director of an airfreight business with a lucrative sideline in weapons bought from a cash-strapped Red Army. By the late 1990s he was considered one of the biggest illegal arms dealers in the world, defying UN arms embargos in Sudan, Rwanda, the Congo, Angola and Sierra Leone. He is said to have supplied weapons to the Taleban, and the Farc group in Colombia. According to intelligence and political sources from the US, the UK, South Africa and Holland, his heavy weapons - including surface-to-air missiles and helicopter gunships - escalated small, localised wars, into major protracted conflicts. With the co-operation of the DEA, This World tells a story of secret agents, covert surveillance and the multimillion dollar arms deal that ends with Mr Bout behind bars at the central court in Bangkok. This World will be broadcast on Monday 17 November at 1900 GMT on BBC Two. Director: Nick Davidson Executive producer: Lucy Hetherington
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