Smulian, who holds UK and South African citizenship originally met Bout through a mutual friend in 1997 when the Russian needed to use of an airstrip in South Africa for his cargo plane business. He also helped Bout obtain business licenses in Swaziland and Zambia. Smulian is set to continue narrating the events that led up to the Bangkok hotel room on Wednesday.
Smulian has been cooperating with US prosecutors for more than three years as part of the investigation into Bout, in the hopes that he will minimize his own sentence. Before his testimony, one of the DEA Agents who had posed as a FARC rebel spent three days in court poring over the audiotapes of the 2008 hotel room encounter and discussing the communications he and fellow agents had with Bout prior to the meeting.
The audio recordings brought to light Bout and Smulian’s offers of advice and assistance to the FARC rebels, promising to help them launder money in Russia, Belarus, and Venezuela.
Bout’s defense team sought to discredit the witness, arguing that the undercover agent, a former member of the Guatemalan military known only by the pseudonym “Carlos Sagastume,” was paid approximately $8.6 million by the US government for undercover operations like the one that resulted in Bout’s arrest.
