The court in Italy approved the extradition of Artem Uss to the United States

A court in Milan approved the extradition to the United States of businessman Artem Uss, the son of the governor of the Krasnoyarsk Territory, Alexander Uss, who was detained there in the fall. informs TASS with reference to the lawyers of the Russian.

“The court approved the extradition on two of the four counts. Within 15 days we will file an appeal with the Court of Cassation,” one of them said.

Uss Jr. was detained on October 17 at Milan airport at the request of the United States. In addition to him, Russians Yuri Orekhov, Svetlana Kuzurgasheva, Timofey Telegin and Sergei Tulyakov, as well as citizens of Venezuela – oil traders Juan Fernando Serrano Ponce and Juan Carlos Soto were detained. The US Department of Justice accuses them of evading sanctions and money laundering. If found guilty, they face up to 30 years in prison. On October 25, the Milan Prosecutor General’s Office formulated an indictment for the extradition of Uss.

After the detention in Milan, a criminal case against Uss Jr. was also initiated in Russia. He was accused of money laundering by an organized group on an especially large scale (clauses “a”, “b” of part 4 of article 174 of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation), after which the Meshchansky District Court of Moscow arrested him in absentia for two months. On January 16, Uss Jr. asked for extradition to Russia. The Russian side sent a corresponding request to the Milan court along with the United States. Uss himself also supported Russia’s extradition request.

At the same time, experts interviewed by Vedomosti doubted in the likelihood of Uss Jr. being extradited to Russia. Political scientist Sergei Komaritsyn, in particular, pointed out that the ex-head of the Krasnoyarsk construction company Restavratsiya, Nikolai Kovalenko, against whom a criminal case was initiated in the fall of 2018, was never extradited by Italy to Russia.