Russian arms dealer Viktor Bout, who was freed in a prisoner swap with United States basketball star Brittney Griner, told Kremlin-run media on Friday that Western countries are seeking to "destroy" and "divide"Russia."The West believes that they did not finish us off in 1990, when the Soviet Union began to disintegrate...
They think that they can just destroy us again and divideRussia," he told state-run channel RT, known previously asRussiaToday.Bout, dubbed the "Merchant of Death" was released Thursday in a prisoner swap in Abu Dhabi involving WNBA star Griner, who was jailed inRussiafor possessing vape cartridges with cannabis oil.The 55-year-old was accused of arming rebels in some of the world's bloodiest conflicts.He said in the interview that he had not encountered any "Russophobia" among his fellow inmates, adding that "basically almost all of my prisoner neighbors had some kind of sympathy forRussia."He gave the interview to Maria Butina, a lawmaker inRussia's lower house of parliament who served 15 months in a United States prison for illegally acting as a foreign agent for Moscow.Bout's notoriety inspired the Hollywood film "Lord of War," starring Nicolas Cage, in which the anti-hero escaped justice.In the interview to RT, Bout criticized the film and said the United States film industry was responsible for producing pro-Washington propaganda."If they had come to me and asked, maybe they would have come up with a more interesting story.
Hollywood these days in my opinion is just a propaganda department (of Washington)," he said.