Do Kwon, the founder of Terraform, was detained in Montenegro and charged with fraud in the US; as a result, South Korea will request his extradition.
Kwon, whose full name is Kwon Do-hyung, is charged with fraud in connection with the abrupt demise of his company Terraform Lab last year, which destroyed about $40 billion in investor capital and rocked the world’s cryptocurrency markets.
Authorities in South Korea confirmed on Friday that they would seek Kwon’s extradition because he is wanted for violating the nation’s capital markets act.
Prosecutors in South Korea will take action to extradite Kwon Do-hyung. According to Kim Hee-kyung, a spokesperson for the Seoul Southern District Prosecutors’ Office, “We are working on the process.”
According to the nation’s interior ministry, the 31-year-old was detained on a South Korean warrant at the Podgorica airport in Montenegro.
After the US Securities and Exchange Commission filed a lawsuit, the US government shortly after charged him with eight counts, including securities fraud and wire fraud.
Prior to the company’s crash in May of last year, Kwon is said to have flown from South Korea to Singapore.
Prosecutors in Seoul asked Interpol to add him to the red notice list for all 195 of the organization’s members in September, and they also cancelled his passport.
However, after the Singapore Police Force stated that he was not in the nation, concerns about his whereabouts grew.
Kwon “used falsified travel documents from Costa Rica” at passport control for a flight to Dubai, according to Montenegro authorities, who claimed this on Thursday.
Their luggage was also found to contain travel documents from South Korea and Belgium, and Interpol investigations revealed that the Belgian documents were fake, according to the interior ministry of Montenegro.
When Kwon’s Luna and Terra went into a death spiral, many investors lost their entire life savings, and South Korean authorities have launched numerous criminal investigations into the crash.
The National Police Agency of South Korea declared that it would work with the nation’s prosecutors to obtain Kwon’s extradition.
According to Jeong Beom-seok from the National Police Agency, who works closely with Interpol, “we will actively cooperate with the Seoul Southern District Prosecutors’ Office.”
The US Securities and Exchange Commission charges Kwon with “orchestrating a multi-billion dollar crypto asset securities fraud.”
