Podgorica, Montenegro — Montenegro’s government has given the green light to extradite a prominent South Korean businessman popularly known as “the cryptocurrency king” to the United States, according to a statement released by the country’s Justice Ministry on Friday.
Minister Bojan Bozovic has signed an order facilitating the extradition of Do Kwon, the founder of the Singapore-based cryptocurrency company Terraform Labs, who was detained in Montenegro last year. However, specifics regarding the timeline for Kwon’s transfer to the U.S. have yet to be disclosed.
This decision comes after a lengthy legal process concerning Kwon’s extradition. Both South Korea and the United States have sought his transfer, leading to multiple rulings across various courts in Montenegro over the months, with some decisions overturning previous rulings on whether Kwon should be sent to the U.S. or South Korea.
The announcement from the Justice Ministry referenced the most recent determination issued by Montenegro’s Supreme Court, indicating that conditions for Kwon’s extradition to one of the requesting countries have been satisfied, and that the ultimate decision rests with the justice minister.
The ministry noted that additional legal factors favored extraditing Kwon to the United States. Kwon’s legal team in Montenegro expressed that they were informed of the minister’s decision through news reports and emphasized that their client cannot be extradited until they have formally received the ruling.
“The minister’s actions reflect unlawful behavior. The courts had previously ruled twice to extradite Do Kwon to South Korea,” lawyers Goran Rodi? and Marija Radulovi? stated in a public declaration.
Kwon faces serious charges in the United States, where federal prosecutors in New York have accused him of fraud related to the collapse of Terraform Labs’ cryptocurrency, which resulted in significant financial losses for retail investors globally, amounting to around $40 billion.
Last year, he, along with another South Korean individual, was apprehended in Montenegro while attempting to travel to Dubai with counterfeit Costa Rican passports. Kwon has already undergone a prison sentence in Montenegro for using forged identification.
He and five additional associates linked to Terraform Labs have been sought on charges involving fraud and financial misconduct tied to the downfall of their digital currencies in May 2022. TerraUSD was intended to function as a “stablecoin,” linked to stable assets like the US dollar to minimize drastic price fluctuations. However, following a significant drop, the value for holders of TerraUSD and its sister currency, Luna, plummeted, wiping out approximately $40 billion in market value.
