Iran and North Korea: Terror in the Same Discussion

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DOJ expected to charge 5 Iranians in 2013 hacking of New York dam

FNC: The Department of Justice is expected to announce charges against up to five Iranians believed to be tied to the 2013 hacking of a New York dam, a law enforcement source told Fox News.

The DOJ is expected to make the announcement sometime in the coming days, according to the source. The individuals are believed to have connections within the Iranian government.

The hackers allegedly infiltrated the control system of the Bowman Ave Dam in Rye Brook, N.Y., which is about 20 miles outside New York City, The Wall Street Journal reported at the time. The breach raised fears of the vulnerabilities of the United States’ infrastructure to foreign hackers. It also came at a time that the Iranians were on the offensive in attacking U.S. banks.

It was believed at the time that the hackers never took control of the dam, but were able to probe the system, the report said.

The expected DOJ announcement was first reported by The Wall Street Journal.

In this case, the hackers were believed to have gained access to the dam through a cellular modem, the paper reported in 2015, citing an unclassified Homeland Security summary of the case that did not specifically name the dam. Two unnamed sources told the paper that the summary was referring to the relatively small, 20-foot-tall, concrete dam about 5 miles from Long Island sound. The dam is used for flood control in the area.

Initially, intelligence analysts feared the hackers were targeting another dam: The Arthur R. Bowman Dam in Oregon, a 245-foot-tall earthen structure that irrigates local agriculture and prevents flooding near the town of Prineville, approximately 150 miles southeast of Portland. That belief prompted investigators to notify the White House that Iran had escalted its cyberwar with the United States.

The source told Fox News that the upcoming charges are expected to come out of the U.S. Attorney’s Office in the Southern District of New York.

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North Korea reportedly orders more tests to build up nuclear attack capability

FNC: North Korean dictator Kim Jong Un reportedly ordered officials Friday to improve its nuclear attack capability by conducting more weapons test.

Reuters reported, citing North Korea’s official news agency (KCNA), that Kim watched a ballistic missile test take place but was most likely referring to the country firing two rockets into the sea as a response to South Korea’s new round of sanctions.

“Dear comrade Kim Jon Un said work… must be strengthened to improve nuclear attack capability and issued combat tasks to continue nuclear explosion tests to assess the power of newly developed nuclear warheads and tests to improve nuclear attack capability,” KCNA reported.

Earlier this week, Kim was quoted by state media as saying North Korea had miniaturized nuclear warheads to mount on ballistic missiles. Photographs showed him standing around what was perceived to be a nuclear warhead.

North Korea also “liquidated” South Korean assets at the closed joint factory park in the North Korean border town of Daesong and at a scrapped tourism resort at Diamond Mountain Thursday.

In a continuation of bellicose rhetoric that has spiked in recent weeks, it said North Korea will also impose “lethal” military, political and economic blows on the South Korean government to accelerate its “pitiable demise.”

South Korea’s government called the North Korean statement a “provocative act” and warned the North not to damage any South Korean assets.

The missiles fired by North Korea on Thursday flew about 310 miles before falling into the ocean off the country’s east coast, Seoul’s Defense Ministry said. They were believed to be Scud-type missiles, ministry spokesman Moon Sang Gyun said.

Such missile firings by the North are not uncommon when animosity rises. North Korea hates the annual military drills staged by Seoul and Washington, calling them preparations for an invasion. The allies say the drills, which this year are described as the biggest ever, are defensive and routine. North Korea warned at the start of the drills Monday of pre-emptive nuclear strikes.

On Wednesday, North Korea printed photos in official media of a purported mock-up of part of a nuclear warhead, with Kim repeating a claim that his country has developed miniaturized atomic bombs that can be placed on missiles.

Information from secretive, authoritarian North Korea is often impossible to confirm, and the country’s state media have a history of photo manipulation. But it was the first time the North has publicly displayed its purported nuclear designs, though it remains unclear whether the country has functioning warheads of that size or is simply trying to develop one.

South Korea’s Defense Ministry on Wednesday disputed the North’s claim that it possesses miniaturized warheads.

The United States said Wednesday it has dispatched three B-2 stealth bombers capable of launching nuclear as well as conventional weapons to the Asia-Pacific region. The U.S. Strategic Command said the bombers will conduct training with the Australian military during their deployment, which amounts to a show of force at a time of mounting tensions with North Korea.

UN Report, Weapons Trafficking: Hamas, Islamic State, AQ

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Egypt discovers enormous tunnels coming from Gaza Tunnels big enough to fit a truck have been discovered by the Egyptian military on the Sinai-Gaza border. These tunnels are allegedly the source of weapons being used by ISIS and Islamic Jihad in the peninsula, and point to a thriving weapons industry in the Strip.

Alex Fishman

Israel News  Hamas has been digging tunnels on the border of Egypt that are big enough to permit vehicles the size of trucks to go through, according to Egyptian security officials.

The tunnels connect the Gaza Strip with the Sinai Peninsula, and are being built in order to compensate for the tunnels which were flooded or blocked by the Egyptians.

These enormous tunnels, some of which stretch for over three kilometers, are designed to traverse the security zone Egypt set up between the border with Gaza and the Sinai. This security zone – which ranges between half a kilometer and a kilometer in length on the Egyptian side – has been cleared out of any buildings or people. The area has also been flooded in order to block the existing shafts into the tunnels.

These tunnels are meant to transfer fighters and weapons, as well as building materials and other imports in an effort by Hamas to break the economic siege imposed on the Strip, Egyptian officials said.

Israeli security officials don’t know of any tunnels that large crossing into Israel. However, if they do exist, Israel will have to take into account the possibility of the existence of tunnels that are over three kilometers in length, which will make them harder to find.

Israel estimates that the recent increase in the number of tunnel collapses in Gaza in the past several months is due to the increased difficulty in obtaining materials to structurally support the tunnels – principally wood and cement. To replace these materials, Hamas is using fiberglass, which is also illegal to import into the Strip. Hamas still tries to smuggle it in, even though the material can’t support the same amount of weight as cement, and collapses.

The Egyptian government also notes another worrying phenomenon regarding the relations between Hamas and the terrorist organizations in the Sinai: it turns out that Hamas has become a weapons exporter to Egypt. In the past several months, several types of weapons were found by Egyptian security forces which bear the markings of being manufactured by the Hamas military wing.

Amongst the weapons found were solar water heaters filled with explosive materials, which are one of the deadliest weapons ISIS in Sinai uses against the Egyptian military. The solar water heaters are used as IEDs with the ability to take out a tank. A few years ago, Hamas used one of these IEDs and disabled an Israeli tank.

The Egyptian government also claims that ISIS shoots Hamas-made rockets at Egyptian military bases in the peninsula.

Hamas also ships weapons from the Gaza Strip to elements affiliated with global Islamic Jihad which is active in Sinai. These are weapons which were smuggled into Gaza either by the Iranians or from Libya, which then ended up in the hands of the jihadists.

At present, there is a new reason to worry – the export of weapons made in the Strip in industrial quantities is a new phenomenon which indicates a new level of institutionalization of the weapons manufacturing process in the Gaza Strip.

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But it is much worse especially when the United Nations is pinpointing violations that curiously involves The Turi Defense Group, noted for supplying weapons to Benghazi, Libya.

U.N. Report Sees Array of Nations, People and Companies Breaking Libyan Arms Embargo

WSJ: A United Nations report has found an array of companies, individuals and countries supplying arms to factions in Libya, breaking a long-standing international arms embargo placed on the politically unstable and divided North African country.

In the report, which was submitted to the Security Council in January and is soon to be made public, U.N. investigators allege sanctions were broken in 2014 and 2015 with shipments of military equipment from the United Arab Emirates, Egypt and Turkey, among others. In some cases, goods were transported across countries, such as Jordan, and in others transport was supplied by firms with close associations to states such as shippers from Ukraine, the report says.

U.N. officials said they are also investigating actions of two U.S.-based companies that investigators said appear to have brokered an arms deal in 2011, as well as an Italian middleman working with a U.K.-based Libyan national on behalf of the Libyan authorities in control of Tripoli.

The Security Council will consider evidence presented in the report and decide what, if any, action to take against U.N. member nations and the individuals allegedly involved.

The Security Council placed the arms embargo on Libya and all warring factions during the Arab Spring revolution in 2011, as part of an international military intervention against former dictator Moammar Gadhafi, who eventually was deposed and killed by Libyan rebels.

The arms embargo, as well as asset freezes for several former regime officials and for state institutions such as the sovereign-wealth fund, remain in place as Libya struggles to regain political and security stability.

The weapons in question were destined for Libya’s two rival governments and their allied militias, which have been fighting for control of the oil-rich nation since the summer of 2014, according to the report.

Since 2014, competing authorities have in effect divided Libya into two. The government based in Tripoli is a collection of regional and Islamic militias and allied politicians. The regime based in Tobruk represents many regions across Libya and won the country’s most recent election in 2014. The U.N., however, recently has brokered a new unity government that is still being formed.

Officials from the government in Tobruk have confirmed they have received weapons from friendly allies but say such arms were necessary for self-defense. “I don’t think the Security Council should have any say in who the Libyan government buys or receives weapons from,” said Abdulsalam Nasiya, an official with the House of Representatives in Tobruk.

Saad Sharada, a member of the congress based in Tripoli, said his political allies have received military personnel carriers, but he denied they have procured any weapons.

“Arms and ammunition are continuing to be transferred to various parties in Libya, with the involvement of member states and complex networks of brokering companies that do not appear to be deterred by the arms embargo,” the report states.

The report devotes separate sections to nation states and individuals that investigators believe are complicit in sanctions violations. It includes more than 100 pages of documentation including copies of arms orders, invoices, end-user certificates, as well as serial numbers and photos of armaments which were once held in national militaries but that have ended up in the country.

Libyan and international officials told U.N. investigators the government in Tobruk had been receiving equipment from abroad, through its own procurement operations and from countries supporting it, according to the report. Those countries include Egypt and the U.A.E., according to two people familiar with the situation.

Investigators allege the U.A.E. approved weapons shipments to the Tobruk government, in addition to allowing its national companies to sell weapons to that faction.

Investigators said the U.A.E. has largely been unresponsive to requests for explanation and comment about allegations its government approved direct arms shipments to Libya’s Tobruk-based authorities and allowed U.A.E. companies to ship weapons. A person familiar with the situation said the U.A.E. government wouldn’t be issuing any comment about the report.

The report says Egyptian military hardware, including attack helicopters, ended up in the arsenal of the Tobruk regime. It cites photos of the helicopters, including tail numbers.

U.N. officials contacted Egypt to obtain further information on what investigators believe were official government transfers of arms, according to a person familiar with the situation. Egypt responded that the panel’s information regarding the transfers was incorrect and that it was fully committed to the implementation of U.N. resolutions, the report said.

The Sudanese government is alleged to have shipped ammunition, among other weaponry. The report shows pictures of samples of the ammunition.

Rabie Abdelaty, spokesman for Sudan’s information ministry, said on Thursday that his government has yet to see the U.N. report, but he described the allegations as untrue. “We are for peace, and we support the U.N.,” Mr. Abdelaty said. “We can’t side with anybody who is trying to destabilize Libya or any other country. That’s not how we operate,” Mr. Abdelaty said. He added that Khartoum has deployed more troops to patrol the border with Libya to ensure there aren’t illicit arms flows.

Turkish arms manufacturers are said by the report to have sold and shipped weapons to Libyan actors, while Ukrainian national companies are alleged to have been involved in shipping armaments.

Turkish officials told the U.N. their government was committed to upholding the embargo and that it was investigating incidents detailed in the report in which Turkish arms manufacturers allegedly sold and shipped weapons to Libyan actors, according to the report. Turkish officials didn’t immediately respond to WSJ requests to comment.

And Ukraine in previous responses to the investigators said it was looking into the allegations in the report that its national companies were involved in shipping armaments to Libya.

The U.N. report also says arms shipments had often passed through Jordan en route to Libya. Jordanian officials told U.N. investigators the government had no record of flights using Jordanian airspace to transport illegal cargoes of weapons to Libya. A Jordanian government spokesman told The Wall Street Journal that the allegations in the U.N. report weren’t accurate.

Meanwhile, investigators are looking into an Armenian-registered airline the report alleges transported arms and materiel from the U.A.E. via Jordan on behalf of Libyans allied with the regime based in Tobruk.

The airline Veteran Avia, which is based in the Armenian capital of Yerevan and operates out of Sharjah, U.A.E., couldn’t immediately be reached to comment. Armenian government officials told U.N. investigators the airline confirmed it had flown cargo from the U.A.E. via Jordan to Libya, but that the cargo was humanitarian aid, according to a U.N. official familiar with the situation.

The U.S. companies mentioned in the U.N. report have been named in U.S. criminal cases brought by American authorities over the alleged arms deal in Libya, according to court filings and documents published as part of the 215-page report submitted to the Security Council in January.

Representatives of the two companies—Turi Defense Group and Dolarian Capital—couldn’t immediately be reached to comment. Status of the court cases isn’t clear. Both companies, which the report said worked together to broker the alleged arms deal, have previously denied any wrongdoing. Lawyers for Turi Defense have moved to have the cases dismissed.

U.N. Investigators report on a regular basis about violations of the U.N. arms embargo. The January report to the Security Council underscores how regional actors have exacerbated the continuing political schisms by providing weapons to their favored militias and rival governments.

The U.N. report also cites alleged payments by Libyan Central Bank officials to members of Libyan militias that have been classified as terrorist organizations, namely Ansar Sharia, the group in Benghazi that U.S. officials hold responsible for the 2012 attack on the U.S. Consulate and CIA safe house that killed four American officials.

Two Central Bank checks made out for 6 million Libyan dinars ($4.2 million) were cashed by the Benghazi Revolutionaries Shura Council, an umbrella group of militias in that eastern city to which Ansar Sharia belongs. Officials from the Central Bank didn’t reply to U.N. requests for comment or clarification, the report says.

 

Putin Whacked a Defector in a DC Hotel?

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InquisitR: Metropolitan Police Officer Sean Hickman said officers were called to the Dupont Circle Hotel at close to 11:30 a.m. on Thursday and found a man dead. The Russian embassy in Washington confirmed that man was Mikhail Lesin.

A Russian embassy spokesperson told Sputnik, another Russian state-run news outlet, about Lesin’s sudden death.

“Our consular officials had an opportunity to confirm that the Russian national who passed away in DC is indeed Mikhail Lesin. Out of respect to the privacy and sensitivity of the matter we are not at liberty to disclose any other information, and would ask you to refer all further requests to his family and the law enforcement officials.”

Mikhail Lesin is recognized with creating the English-language news network Russia Today. Now known as RT, and backed by the Russian government, the network “provides an alternative perspective on major global events, and acquaints an international audience with the Russian viewpoint,” according to its website.

Last year, one U.S. lawmaker claimed Mikhail Lesin “led the Kremlin’s efforts to censor Russia’s independent television outlets.”

Former Putin Aide, Found in Washington, Died From Blows to Head

NYT: Washington — A former close aide to President Vladimir V. Putin of Russia who was found dead in a hotel room in the Dupont Circle neighborhood in November died of blunt force injuries to the head, the chief medical examiner’s office here said on Thursday. Russian state media had reported that the aide, Mikhail Y. Lesin, died in the hotel of a heart attack.

A member of Mr. Lesin’s family who reportedly spoke with RIA Novosti, the state news agency, also said in November that Mr. Lesin had died of a heart attack.

On Thursday the medical examiner’s office said that Mr. Lesin’s body showed signs of blunt force injury not only to the head but to the neck and torso, as well as upper and lower extremities. The medical examiner’s office did not explain the timing of the announcement, although officials said that findings often take 60 to 90 days.

The matter remains the subject of a police investigation here. A spokesman for the Metropolitan Police Department, Lt. Sean Conboy, declined on Thursday to provide additional comment. Andrew Ames, a spokesman for the F.B.I. in Washington, also had no comment.

The death of Mr. Lesin, who was 59, had prompted no shortage of speculation here and in Russia in recent months.

Mr. Lesin’s body was found in a hotel room with no signs of life at about 11:30 a.m. on Nov. 5.

Lesin was once a political leader, a media advertising executive and an inside advisor to Putin. He was head of communications for the Russian Federation and Minister of Press under Putin.

In 2011, Lesin moved from Russia to Beverly Hills where he has connections at Warner Brothers. He did in fact return to Russia in 2013 where he led the marketing. propaganda and media for Gazprom an oil infrastructure of which Putin has ownership.

On December 3, 2014, Assistant Attorney General Peter J. Kadzik replied to Senator Wicker’s letter by stating the Justice Department’s Criminal Division and the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) have been referred for appropriate disposition of Mikhail Lesin and “similarly situated Russian individuals and companies with assets in the United States that may be in violation of the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act and the Anti-Money Laundering Statutes.” The properties are located at

$13.8 million house of 1,200 square metres (13,000 sq ft) at 10 Beverly Park, Beverly Hills, California
$9 million house of 980 square metres (10,500 sq ft) at 321 Bristol Avenue, Brentwood, Los Angeles, California
$5.6 million house of 630 square metres (6,800 sq ft) in Beverly Park, Los Angeles, California
$4.3 million house along Mulholland Drive at 13327 Java Drive, Beverly Hills, California
$3.995 million house of 570 square metres (6,100 sq ft) in Palisades Highlands, Pacific Palisades, Los Angeles, California
It’s unclear if the FBI ever initiated a probe into this matter yet given the results of the autopsy…..other investigations are likely now underway.

Expectation of Lynch to Prosecute Hillary Dashed?

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Would there be major chaos and embarrassment if FBI Director James Comey resigned over the Hillary Server-gate scandal? Is Comey at odds with his boss Loretta Lynch? He threatened to resign during the Bush administration….he is his own principled man.

Comey’s FBI makes waves

TheHill: The aggressive posture of the FBI under Director James Comey is becoming a political problem for the White House.

The FBI’s demand that Apple help unlock an iPhone used by one of the San Bernardino killers has outraged Silicon Valley, a significant source of political support for President Obama and Democrats.

Comey, meanwhile, has stirred tensions by linking rising violent crime rates to the Black Lives Matter movement’s focus on police violence and by warning about “gaps” in the screening process for Syrian refugees.

Then there’s the biggest issue of all: the FBI’s investigation into the private email server used by Hillary Clinton Obama’s former secretary of State and the leading contender to win the Democratic presidential nomination.

A decision by the FBI to charge Clinton or her top aides for mishandling classified information would be a shock to the political system.

In these cases and more, Comey — a Republican who donated in 2012 to Mitt Romney — has proved he is “not attached to the strings of the White House,” said Ron Hosko, the former head of the FBI’s criminal investigative division and a critic of Obama’s law enforcement strategies.

Publicly, administration officials have not betrayed any worry about the Clinton probe. They have also downplayed any differences of opinion on Apple.

But former officials say the FBI’s moves are clearly ruffling feathers within the administration.

With regards to the Apple standoff, “It’s just not clear [Comey] is speaking for the administration,” said Richard Clarke, a former White House counterterrorism and cybersecurity chief. “We know there have been administration meetings on this for months. The proposal that Comey had made on encryption was rejected by the administration.”

Comey has a reputation for speaking truth to power, dating back to a dramatic confrontation in 2004 when he rushed to a hospital to stop the Bush White House from renewing a warrantless wiretapping program while Attorney General John Ashcroft was gravely ill. Comey was Ashcroft’s deputy at the time.

That showdown won Comey plaudits from both sides of the aisle and made him an attractive pick to lead the FBI. But now that he’s in charge of the agency, the president might be getting more than he bargained for.

“Part of his role is to not necessarily be in lock step with the White House,” said Mitch Silber, a former intelligence official with the New York City Police Department and current senior managing director at FTI Consulting.

“He takes very seriously the fact that he works for the executive branch,” added Leo Taddeo, a former agent in the FBI’s cyber division. “But he also understands the importance of maintaining his independence as a law enforcement agency that needs to give not just the appearance of independence but the reality of it.”

The split over Clinton’s email server is the most politically charged issue facing the FBI, with nothing less than the race for the White House potentially at stake.

Obama has publicly defended Clinton, saying that while she “made a mistake” with her email setup, it was “not a situation in which America’s national security was endangered.”

But the FBI director has bristled at that statement, saying the president would not have any knowledge of the investigation. Comey, meanwhile, told lawmakers last week that he is “very close, personally,” to the probe.

Obama’s comments reflected a pattern, several former agents said, of the president making improper comments about FBI investigations. In 2012, he made similarly dismissive comments about a pending inquiry into then-CIA Director David Petraeus, who later pleaded guilty to a misdemeanor charge for giving classified information to his biographer, with whom he had a personal relationship.

“It serves no one in the United States for the president to comment on ongoing investigations,” Taddeo said. “I just don’t see a purpose.”

Hosko suggested that a showdown over potential criminal charges for Clinton could lead to a reprise of the famous 2004 hospital scene, when Comey threatened to resign.

“He has that mantle,” Hosko said. “I think now there’s this expectation — I hope it’s a fair one — that he’ll do it again if he has to.”

Comey’s independent streak has also been on display in the Apple fight, when his bureau decided to seek a court order demanding that the tech giant create new software to bypass security tools on an iPhone used by Syed Rizwan Farook, one of the two terrorist attackers in San Bernardino, Calif.

Many observers questioned whether the FBI was making an end-run around the White House, which had previously dismissed a series of proposals that would force companies to decrypt data upon government request.

“I think there’s actually some people that don’t think with one mindset on this issue within the administration,” said Sen. Tom Carper (D-Del.), the Senate Homeland Security Committee’s top Democrat, at a Tuesday hearing. “It’s a tough issue.”

While the White House has repeatedly backed the FBI’s decision, it has not fully endorsed the potential policy ramifications, leaving some to think a gap might develop as similar cases pop up. The White House is poised to soon issue its own policy paper on the subject of data encryption.

“The position taken by the FBI is at odds with the concerns expressed by individuals [in the White House] who were looking into the encryption issue,” said Neema Singh Guliani, a legislative counsel with the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU).

This week, White House homeland security adviser Lisa Monaco tried to downplay the differences between the two sides. The White House and FBI are both grappling with the same problems, she said in a discussion at the Council on Foreign Relations.

“There is a recognition across the administration that the virtues of strong encryption are without a doubt,” Monaco said on Monday. “There is also uniformity about the recognition that strong encryption poses real challenges.”

But former officials see Comey as wanting to blaze his own trail on the topic.

“I have been very surprised at how public and inflammatory, frankly, the FBI and the Justice Department’s approach has been on this,” said Chris Finan, a former National Security Council cybersecurity adviser.

“That doesn’t tend to be the administration’s preferred approach to handling things.”

The Republican National Committee is suing Hillary and they are on the right track in one case for certain, those communications in her mobile devices.

FreeBeacon: he RNC is requesting communications between Clinton and her key aides, including Bryan Pagliano, her former IT staffer. Pagliano has reportedly received a limited immunity deal from the Department of Justice as part of its investigation into the transmission of classified information over Clinton’s private email server.

The committee is also seeking correspondence between State Department officials and the Clinton campaign that took place after Clinton stepped down from the department.

According to the RNC, it originally submitted public records requests for these documents last October and December, but the State Department has yet to turn over the records. The RNC filed the lawsuits on Wednesday in the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia.

“The Obama Administration has failed to comply with records requests in a timely manner as required by law,” RNC chairman Reince Priebus said in a statement on Wednesday. “For too long the State Department has undermined the public and the media’s legitimate right to records under the Freedom of Information Act, and it’s time it complies with the law. If this administration claims to be the ‘most transparent in history,’ and Clinton the ‘most transparent person in public life,’ then they should prove it, release these records, and allow the American people to hold her accountable.”

The State Department is currently facing a number of legal proceedings seeking documents from Clinton’s tenure. The watchdog group Citizens United filed another lawsuit against the department on Monday requesting emails between Dennis Cheng, Clinton’s deputy chief of protocol, and Teneo Holdings, a consulting company run by Clinton confidante Doug Band.

Two lawsuits have been delayed due to the State Department’s discovery of thousands of previously unsearched documents from the executive secretary’s office, the Washington Free Beacon reported last week. The State Department said it could take until next fall to process the newly discovered records and turn them over to the plaintiffs.

AG Loretta Lynch Dodges Questions About Hillary Clinton Email Investigation

PJM: Attorney General Loretta Lynch suggested Wednesday that the Justice Department would not be obligated to pursue charges against Hillary Clinton for her email infractions even if the FBI recommends criminal charges.

 

Sen. John Cornyn (R-TX) brought up the topic during a Senate Judiciary Committee hearing on Wednesday:

“If the FBI were to make a referral to the Department of Justice to pursue a case by way of indictment and to convene a grand jury for that purpose, the Department of Justice is not required by law to do so, are they — are you?” Cornyn asked.Lynch didn’t answer directly, but seemed to indicate the department has some wiggle room, and can consult with officials before deciding what to do.

“It would not be an operation of law, it would be an operation of procedures,” Lynch said in reply. She added that the decision to pursue a criminal case would be “done in conjunction with the agents” involved in the investigation. “It’s not something that we would want to cut them out of the process.”

Lynch declined to answer Cornyn’s questions about the decision to grant immunity to Bryan Pagliano, the former Clinton aide who set up the private “homebrew” server at her home in Chappaqua, NY. Asked Cornyn:

If in fact this was immunity granted by a court, that had to be done under the auspices and with the approval of the Department of Justice, which you head.

Lynch answered:

We don’t discuss the specifics of any ongoing investigation. With respect to the procedure relating to any specific witness, I would not be able to comment. … With respect to Mr. Pagliano or anyone who has been identified as a potential witness in any case, I’m not able to comment on the specifics.

Later, Senator Lindsey Graham (R-SC) asked Lynch about comments made by White House Press Secretary Josh Earnest in January that downplayed the FBI investigation. Earnest had told reporters that “some officials” had said she was “not the target of the investigation,” and that an indictment did not seem to be the direction in which the case was trending:

“So when Josh Earnest speaks about the investigation and talks about, basically, to reassure the American people that this is no big deal, do you know where he gets that information from?” Graham asked.“Senator, I do not,” Lynch said.

“Would you tell him that he should just stay silent?” Graham pressed.

“Certainly it’s my hope when it comes to ongoing investigations that we would all stay silent,” Lynch responded.

In January, Fox News’ chief intelligence correspondent Catherine Herridge reported that her sources in the DOJ and FBI were “super pissed off” about Earnest’s comments.

 

Hey John Kerry Read the Genocide Convention

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The Genocide Convention, it IS a Treaty:

Article 2 of the convention defines genocide as

…any of the following acts committed with intent to destroy, in whole or in part, a national, ethnical, racial or religious group, as such:

(a) Killing members of the group;
(b) Causing serious bodily or mental harm to members of the group;
(c) Deliberately inflicting on the group conditions of life calculated to bring about its physical destruction in whole or in part;
(d) Imposing measures intended to prevent births within the group;
(e) Forcibly transferring children of the group to another group.

— Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide, Article 2

Article 3 defines the crimes that can be punished under the convention:

(a) Genocide;
(b) Conspiracy to commit genocide;
(c) Direct and public incitement to commit genocide;
(d) Attempt to commit genocide;
(e) Complicity in genocide.

— Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide, Article 3

In part from CNS: “I will make a decision on it as soon as I have that additional evaluation and we will proceed forward from there,” Kerry said.

Kerry was responding to a question put to him by Rep. Jeff Fortenberry (R.-Neb.), who is the sponsor of a resolution that would declare on behalf of Congress that it is in fact genocide.  The Knights of Columbus and In Defense of Christians are sponsoring an online petition asking Kerry  to “declare that Christians, along with Yazidis and other minorities, are targets on ongoing genocide.”

Feb 25, 2016 – Congressman Rohrabacher slams Secretary of State John Kerry with the truth. Many Americans are proud in supporting Israel while ignoring the slaughter of innocent Christians in Iraq, Syria, Libya and Egypt. They are deaf to the cries of Christians in SE Ukraine (Donbass). They ignore the resurrection of Christianity in Russia. Is America still a Christian nation? If so, then why won’t they defend Christians around the world?

     

Report details ISIS atrocities against Christians, presses State for ‘genocide’ label

FNC: Holding a bloody shirt he carries with him to remember the Islamic State’s crimes against Iraqi Christians, Douglas Bazi described for a Washington audience Thursday how he’s suffered at ISIS’ hands: He was kidnapped, had his teeth bashed in with a hammer and watched as his church was bombed.

“There is not ‘life’ in Iraq,” Bazi said, noting his congregation has been targeted so often it is called the “church of the martyrs, or the church of the blood.”

Bazi joined Middle Eastern Christian leaders and human rights advocates from the Knights of Columbus on Thursday as the group, along with In Defense of Christians (IDC), released a powerful and comprehensive report they say makes the case that the terror campaign against Christians and other minorities in Syria, Iraq and other parts of the Middle East can only be called one thing: genocide.

The report, along with the personal accounts conveyed at the National Press Club in Washington on Thursday, put even more pressure on the Obama administration to officially label the atrocities as genocide.

The State Department and White House so far have not done so, but are facing a congressionally mandated March 17 deadline to make a decision.

“We are forgotten, and we are alone,” Bazi, a former ISIS hostage and now a priest at an Irbil refugee camp, lamented.

Bazi was joined by Irbil-based Dankha Joola, who pointed out that of the 2 million Christians who lived in Iraq before the war, fewer than 300,000 reside there today — many victims of killings and kidnappings, others forced to leave their homes by radicals, Al Qaeda, and now ISIS.

Carl Anderson, head of the Knights of Columbus, which produced the 278-page document with IDC, hopes this report will help advance their cause.

*** Christian population in the Middle East

*** Map of Christian Persecution in the Middle East

 

“The evidence contained in this report as well as the evidence relied upon by the European Parliament fully support — I would suggest compel — the conclusion that reasonable grounds exist to believe the crime of genocide has been committed,” Anderson said.

The report lists 1,131 Iraqi Christians killed between 2003 and June 9, 2014, including where they were killed and when. It also incorporates 24 pages of witness statements collected between February and March of this year, and nearly 200 documented attacks — including destruction of property, sexual assaults, enslavement, torture, imprisonment and killing — in Iraq, Syria and North Africa. Also included is a documenting of attacks on 125 Iraqi churches from 2003 to 2014.

The report also features a legal brief arguing that the crimes committed rise to the level of the Genocide Convention Implementation Act of 1987, and the Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide.

The European Parliament in February already declared that genocide is taking place in the Middle East against Christians, Yazidis and other ethnic and religious minorities at the hands of the Islamic State.

“While we believe this to be the most comprehensive report on this subject to date, covering incidents in Iraq, Syria, Libya, Egypt and Yemen, we continue to receive new reports and new evidence,” Anderson said Thursday. But with new reports pouring in every day, he cautioned: “It may only be the tip of the iceberg.”

There have been widespread reports of crucifixions, beheadings and kidnappings, with women and girls forced into marriages with ISIS fighters, or sold into sexual slavery. In Syria, Christians once accounted for 10 percent of the population, but today their numbers have declined to an estimated 1 million or less. Last summer, ISIS kidnapped nearly 300 Christians from Syrian villages and later ransomed them back for $100,000 per person. The money was raised by the Assyrian Christian diaspora.

On March 4, gunmen stormed a Catholic retirement home in Yemen and gunned down 16 people, including four Indian nuns affiliated with the order established by Mother Teresa. According to reports, the city of Aden where the attack occured has seen its Christian population flee.

While groups like the Knights of Columbus, a Catholic organization, press the administration to make the genocide designation, Congress is applying similar pressure.

There are bills with strong bipartisan support in both the House and Senate expressing the sense of Congress that those who commit or support violence against Christians and other ethnic minorities including Yazidis, Turkmen and Kurds for ethnic or religious reasons are committing genocide.

When pressed, Secretary of State John Kerry said in a recent House Foreign Affairs Committee hearing that “you have to get facts from the ground, more than just anecdotal.”

The Knights of Columbus say they were asked to conduct Thursday’s report by David Saperstein, ambassador at-large for religious freedom at the State Department, to give the administration the evidence “on the ground,” and hopes it will clarify matters in Foggy Bottom.

When asked on March 1 why the administration has yet to make the determination, White House spokesman Josh Earnest said the word genocide “involves a very specific legal determination that has, at this point, not been reached.”

Advocates say this report proves the legal thresholds have been met, and then some.

“We think the legal question is met and I would reiterate that what is required by the statute is a finding of probable cause, which is not beyond a shadow of a doubt, it that there are reasonable grounds to believe that this crime has occurred and is occurring,” said Anderson, “and I think the facts in this report establish, compellingly, that there are reasonable grounds to believe this crime is being committed.”

The State Department did not return a request for comment, though administration officials have said they recognize and will work to address the violence against Christians and other groups regardless of the words used to describe it.

At least three presidential cadidates — Sens. Marco Rubio and Ted Cruz on the Republican side, and former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton on the Democratic side — have called on the administration to designate this as a ‘genocide.’