NEW YORK, March 7 (RIA Novosti) - An Armenian
involved in smuggling Russian military arms to the United
States has been given a 22-year sentence, the United States
Attorney's Office for the Southern District of New York said in
a press release.
Artur Solomonyan, 30, and another 17 members of his
international criminal group held talks for about a year with
an FBI agent, who posed as a "terrorist", on the sale of
Russian-made grenade launchers, machine guns and portable
surface-to-air missile systems.
Solomonyan and his accomplices were arrested as soon as
the Federal Bureau of Investigation collected enough evidence
to charge them with conspiring to smuggle arms.
The group's arrest in 2005 was widely covered by American
media. According to an FBI representative's statement at the
time, Solomonyan even offered the "terrorist" enriched uranium
to make an attack on the New York City Subway. However, the
verdict does not mention uranium.
The sentence to another two accomplices will be made
public later in March, while the other group members were
sentenced earlier.
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