RAS AL KHAIMA TO CONFISCATE ABANDONED VIKTOR BOUT AIRCRAFT

C O N F I D E N T I A L DUBAI 000333 SIPDIS SIPDIS TREASURY FOR OFAC BARBARA HAMMERLE AND ANDREAS MORGNER E.O. 12958: DECL: 5/16/2017 TAGS: ECON EAIR ETTC PGOV PINS SOCI KCRM LI AE SUBJECT: RAS AL KHAIMA TO CONFISCATE ABANDONED VIKTOR BOUT AIRCRAFT REF: 06 DUBAI 4121 CLASSIFIED BY: Paul R Sutphin, Consul General, Dubai, UAE. REASON: 1.4 (b),(d) 1.(C) Steve Adams, Vice President of Airport Operations for Ras al-Khaimah (RAK) Airport recently told poleconoff that the RAK Department of Civil Aviation (DCA) would soon be authorized to confiscate and dispose of two aircraft belonging to Viktor Bout (reftel). The two aircraft are a Gulfstream G-1, registration N-12RW and an Ilyushin IL-76, registration 5A-DNI. Both aircraft were operated by Wing Air, which Adams had been told was a Bout company. Adams said that the DCA plans to scrap the IL-76 and will turn the G-1 over to the RAK airport to use for training firefighters. Both aircraft have been parked at RAK airport for more than four years. 2.(C) According to Adams, the UAE General Civil Aviation Authority (GCAA) informed the DCA that it had no objection to the DCA filing a motion with the UAE Ministry of Justice (MoJ) to confiscate two aircraft owned by Viktor Bout. As of mid-May, DCA was still waiting for final MoJ approval to confiscate and dispose of the aircraft. 3.(C) When asked why the process of confiscating the aircraft has taken so long, Adams explained that the GCAA first had to obtain permission from the states of registry - Libya for the IL-76 and the United States for the G-1. Since checking with the countries of registry, the process of approving confiscation has been slowed by bureaucratic inertia. . SUTPHIN