“As I was boarding my flight out of New York I was pulled aside by three CBP officers, who seized my passport. When asked why, they said orders of the State Department. No further information was provided. My bags were removed from the flight, and I was escorted out of the airport,” the former US Marine intelligence officer told Sputnik.
Scott Ritter added that his passport was not given back. He said he will appeal the decision.
Ritter believes US authorities are afraid of his participation in the St. Petersburg International Economic Forum (SPIEF).
“Is this done under the First Amendment to the US Constitution or the Fourth?” Russian Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova asked sarcastically, commenting on Scott Ritter’s removal from his flight to Russia and the confiscation of his passport.
SPIEF is the largest annual Russian business event in the economic sphere, and is attended by dozens of politicians and entrepreneurs from around the world. This year, the forum will take place on June 5-8.
Original published by Sputnik International
Who is Scott Ritter
William Scott Ritter Jr. (born July 15, 1961) is an American author, former United States Marine Corpsintelligence officer, former United Nations Special Commission (UNSCOM) weapons inspector.
Ritter served as a junior military analyst during Operation Desert Storm. He then served as a member of the UNSCOM overseeing the disarmament of weapons of mass destruction (WMD) in Iraq from 1991 to 1998, from which he resigned in protest. He later became a critic of the Iraq War and United States foreign policy in the Middle East. He is a regular contributor to Russian state media outlets RT and Sputnik.
A few weeks ago, his article aroused great interest in which he explained that the few ATACMS missiles supplied by the USA to Ukraine would not have changed the outcome of the war with Russia but could have led to an escalation towards World War III
An even more terrible fate than Scott Ritter had already befallen Gonzalo Lira, the Chilean-American journalist living in Ukraine who dared to criticize Zelensky’s pro-Nazi regime and was arrested and died in prison after torture.
Another emblematic case is that of the famous journalist Tucker Carlson who, before doing his great interview with Russian President Vladimir Putin, was kicked out of Fox News for having conducted an information campaign on the crimes of Big Pharma of killer vaccines and on the Lobby of weapons.
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