VILNIUS, July 29 (RIA Novosti) – The defense team representing a Russian national who is facing extradition from Lithuania to the United States appealed a court’s decision on Monday.
Dmitry Ustinov, 46, was detained at Vilnius Airport in Lithuania on April 15, after he arrived from the US to allegedly negotiate a deal to sell night vision equipment used by the US military.
On July 22, a Vilnius court ordered him to be extradited to the US, where he faces up to 20 years in prison if convicted of charges of money laundering and smuggling export-restricted military equipment.
“We have appealed, although the translation of the court’s ruling into Russian was handed to Ustinov only today,” one of Ustinov’s lawyers told RIA Novosti.
The lawyer said there was a 50-50 chance that the appeal could be upheld by the Lithuanian Appellate Court.
Ustinov, whose detention was based on an arrest warrant from the US state of Delaware, pleaded not guilty in court.
Russia earlier expressed “deep regret” over the Lithuanian court’s ruling and criticized the United States for requesting the extradition of a Russian national from a third country.
Another Russian, Viktor Bout, was convicted by a US court on arms-smuggling charges in November 2011, after being extradited from Thailand despite Russian protests. He was sentenced to 25 years in prison.
