By Yovo Nikolov
The Belgian Le Soir daily has got Bulgaria involved once again in arms deliveries to embargoed states. Some ten days ago, the newspaper reported that four Bulgarian had been arrested under suspicions of arms smuggling and money laundering. A few days later, however, the daily said, the Bulgarian citizens had been released. Bulgarian diplomatic service sources said the suspects had just been called for a check and released, as the suspicions were not confirmed.
Bulgaria, however, is in the focus of the Belgian press in conjunction with an investigation against Viktor Bout, a notorious international arms and diamonds dealer. The Belgian media says 18 apartments in Belgium have been searched in connection with the investigation. There were three detainees: Karlos A., Sangiven R and Julio D. Le Soir reported that empty airplanes had taken off from Ostende airport and then landed in Bourgas where they had been loaded with arms designated for embargoed states. All this happened in the period 1995 - 1997.
The Belgian authorities have not so far made any inquiries from the Bulgarian services about Viktor Bout, born in 1967 in Doushanbe. Such inquiries are common practice. If Bout's traces have ever crossed Bulgaria, it stands to reason that Bulgarian services should have been contacted. However, they declined having been approached with regard to this matter. Vladimir Velichkov, secretary of the State Commission for Control and Permission of International Trade with Arms and Dual-use Goods also declined Belgian inquiries about deals with arms.
Le Soir claims that Viktor Bout is a former KGB officer. What is known about him is that he lived, until recently, in the United Arab Emirates and is among the most prominent arms suppliers for Africa and Asia.
Viktor Bout's name is regularly linked with Bulgaria in connection with the deals he makes with Bulgaria-manufactured weapons. There was significant space devoted to Mr Bout in the 2000 UN Security Council report in connection with suspicions that he had supplied weapons for the Angolan grouping UNITA instead of for the officially declared end client - Togo. In the same report, Bulgaria was accused that it did not adhere to UN-imposed embargo resolutions. Later, Bulgaria was exonerated of these allegations. The investigation, however, showed that counterfeit documents were used, which declared an end client. These documents were made from original copies of a legal arms shipment to Togo.
KAS Engineering Consortium Ltd. (KAS) is the company with which Viktor Bout does business in Bulgaria. Mr Bout visited Bulgaria three times in January, February, and September of1996, according to Le Soir. In 1999, his visits intensified. He visited Bulgaria four times, accompanied by citizens of Russia, Ukraine, or Rwanda. On February 13, 1999, he arrived in Bulgaria in the company of Migusha Ludovic, Kazura Jin Bosko, Johnson Gazangva and Ndahiro Emanuel from Rwanda. By invitation of KAS, the four visited the Sopot Arms plant, Arsenal, Beta - Cherven Briag and Samel - 90. According to data from the Bulgarian special services, an Il-76 airplane, owned by Air Cess, allegedly owned by Mr Bout, took off on January 1, 1998 from Bourgas to Lome in Togo, loaded with special production.
Viktor Anatolievich Bout's brother, Sergei, is a partner in the private Bulgarian Air Zori. In April 1998 he acquired 82 pct of the company. A year later, Air Zori is pronounced bankrupt. The company's manager was Volodia Nachev.
Writing about Viktor Bout, Le Soir involved the Ukrainian air carrier Volare. This company became known in Bulgaria with the fact that in May 2000 one of its air planes was detained at the Bourgas airport after a signal by foreign special services. The plane's crew had asked for a permission to take off for Eritrea (then under a UN embargo) instead of for Georgia, which was what it had declared. The plane spent three months in custody, a period during which an investigation was being conducted. Bulgaria received special gratitude from the UN for its role. Later, however, the plane was surprisingly released by virtue of an ordinance of the Bourgas Regional Prosecution. (A little earlier, Bulgaria's Chief Prosecutor returned from a visit in Ukraine).
Currently, an investigation by the Supreme Prosecution of Cassation is underway in connection with the Volare air carrier against Gen. Atanas Atanassov, former head of the National Security Service.
Mr Bout's connections with Bulgaria and Belgium interlink once again in another mysterious affair. It turned out in 2001, that a phantom plane bearing the Bulgarian initialisation LZ - PCP flew from the USA to Belgium in August. Approached by the Bulgarian authorities, the Belgian side replied that the plane had Bulgarian nationality. There is no such a registration, however, in the Bulgarian aircraft register. It transpired after a check that TIG Ltd company had applied for a registration of such a plane with Civil Aviation directorate at the Ministry of Transport. Among the set of documents, a leasing contract was presented between TIG Ltd. and Tri Star for a Lokheed 1011, registered under number 1152. It is with this initialisation that the plane had landed at the Ostende airport in Belgium.
Yordan Zlatev is one of the owners of TIG Ltd. He is also a partner in Sitrat Air AD together with Volodia Nachev, executive director of Sergei Bout's Air Zori.
A check conducted by the Ministry of Transport showed that the attempts aimed at registering the Lokheed 1011 with the Civil Aviation Directorate, this time under number 1066, continued in early 2002. The procedure was attempted through Ducor World Airlines Ltd. The documents that were submitted for the purpose of the registration included a correspondence between Liberia World Airlines and Ducor World Airlines, registered in Equatorial Guinea. What was puzzling in these documents was that Paul la Roche was pointed out as a representative for both companies. There are serious suspicions that Liberia World Airlines belongs to Viktor Bout. The company was first registered in Gibraltar.
In 1995, it hired hangar No. 5 at Ostende airport. It is believed that Liberia World Airlines was renamed Ducor World Airlines. In July 2001, a Bulgarian branch of the company was registered in Bulgaria.
It is not known where the investigation in Belgium against Viktor Bout will lead to. His ways, however, have crossed Bulgaria too often over the past six years; a fact which makes it difficult for a Bulgarian trace to be easily dismissed.
RosBusinessConsulting.
Thursday, Mar. 7, 2002,
5:29 PM Moscow Time
Yevgeny Primakov, chairman of Russia's Trade and Industrial Chamber, has announced his intention to be a witness in the Hague Tribunal at the trial against former Yugoslav President Slobodan Milosevic. "I want to be a witness not for but against [the prosecution]. Against the shameful farce that is taking place in The Hague," Primakov explained at a news conference in Moscow, answering reporters' questions. The former foreign minister and Prime Minister of Russia believes that Milosevic had played an obviously positive role in the history of Yugoslavia. [The translation is a bit odd]