The Obama administration, intensifying its efforts to defuse an explosion of international organized crime, sent a senior Justice Department official to the Far East this week for meetings with foreign counterparts, the Washington Post reports. Deputy Attorney General David Ogden will meet with justice ministers from dozens of countries at the Interpol General Assembly in Singapore, where they will discuss ways to neutralize criminal enterprises that target cyberspace, financial institutions and energy markets.
Ogden will continue on to Thailand and meet with authorities to discuss the importance of the extradition of arms merchant Viktor Bout, dubbed the “merchant of death.” Federal prosecutors in New York secured an indictment of Bout last year on charges that he attempted to sell weapons to a Colombian organization deemed a terrorist group by U.S. authorities. Bout denies the allegations and his legal status has become a fierce tug of war between the U.S. and Russia. The Bout case is among the highest-profile symbols of an alleged crime threat flourishing on multiple fronts across the globe.