Category Archives: FBI

Now al Shabaab has Ownership of Uranium Set for Iran

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In 2015:

Somali Minister of Petroleum and Mineral Resources, Mohamed Muktar Ibrahim has talked about the Somalia’s Mineral Resources saying that they have made contacts with International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) on the controlling of minerals that can be use chemical weapons.

He noted they are taking measures to prevent raw materials like Uranium to fall into the hands wrong people.

In an exclusive interview he gave to Universal TV, the minister highlighted that they also held talks with UNDP which had information on mining depots in the country as it has surveyed on the country’s mineral deposits in the years between 1965 and 1975.

In a UN report released in 1968 shows that Somalia is a hotspot for uranium.

Somali government is busy amending some provision in the Mineral Law 1984 and compliance with the current conditions in the country now.

To read the full letter, go here.

An Al Qaeda affiliate has seized control of uranium mines in Africa with the intent of supplying the material to Iran, according to a diplomatic letter from a top Somali official appealing to the U.S. for “immediate military assistance.”

The letter, reviewed by Fox News, was addressed to U.S. Ambassador to Somalia Stephen Schwartz. Somalia’s Ambassador to the U.S. Ahmed Awad confirmed to Fox News on Thursday that the letter “has indeed been issued” by Minister of Foreign Affairs Yusuf Garaad Omar, whose signature is on the document.

The Aug. 11-dated letter delivered an urgent warning to the U.S. that the al-Shabaab terror network has linked up with the regional ISIS faction and is “capturing territory” in the central part of the country.

“Only the United States has the capacity to identify and smash Al-Shabaab elements operating within our country. The time for surgical strikes and limited engagement has passed, as Somalia’s problems have metastasized into the World’s problems,” the letter said. “Every day that passes without intervention provides America’s enemies with additional material for nuclear weapons. There can be no doubt that global stability is at stake.”

The State Department would not comment on the diplomatic letter, but did not dispute its authenticity and referred Fox News to the government of Somalia. Iran was supposed to pull back on its nuclear program under the terms of the agreement struck with the Obama administration. More here from FNC.

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Background:

Is Somalia a safe haven for terrorists?

On one hand, Somalia is a chaotic, poor, battle-weary Muslim country with no central government and a long, unguarded coastline. Its porous borders mean that individuals can enter without visas, and once inside the country, enjoy an almost complete lack of law enforcement. Somalia has long served as a passageway from Africa to the Middle East based on its coastal location on the Horn of Africa, just a boat ride away from Yemen. These aspects make Somalia a desirable haven for transnational terrorists, something al-Qaeda has tried to capitalize on before, and is trying again now.

On the other hand, Somalia is different from other failed states in several ways. While it is roughly the size of Afghanistan, its landscape lacks Afghanistan’s many natural hiding places and does not offer the topographical haven of other states like Yemen. It is also a fiercely clan-oriented culture with an aversion to foreign presence of any kind, including Arab jihadi organizations. “When you get these extremist ideologies, the Somalis look at them and they are immediately perceived as foreign,” says Bruton, “They’re perceived as Arab. It’s an Arab ideology. And just as the Somalis are hostile to American ideology, they’re hostile to Arab ideology as well.” Finally, the Somalis–Sufi Muslims since the birth of Islam in the seventh century–have moderate religious views; until recently, Taliban-style fundamentalism was unfamiliar in the country.

These factors were responsible for al-Qaeda’s failure in the 1990s, when it tried working closely with al-Ittihad al-Islami (AIAI). Al-Qaeda was unable to root itself in Somalia’s clan system, and, according to former ambassador to Ethiopia David Shinn, “overestimated the degree to which Somalis would become jihadists.” The experience of the al-Qaeda operatives was so treacherous that Bruton says: “U.S. intelligence officials came up with a verdict that Somalia was actually inoculated from foreign terrorist groups, that it’s just fundamentally inhospitable, that the clan system is so closed to foreigners that there’s just no way that these groups can operate.”

Since the Ethiopian invasion, al-Qaeda has seen a resurgent connection to the country, and HI and al-Shabaab control most of the territory. However, experts disagree over whether Somalia could be the base for an international attack or whether the group will continue its domestic focus. “Personally, my view is that they don’t have much to gain by [partnering with al-Qaeda to conduct an international attack],” Bruton says. “And they probably don’t have the capacity to do it. But it’s worrisome that they’re making the threats, so I think it’s something to be watched and assessed very carefully. But right now, I would say the odds of a transnational attack are very, very low.”  More here.

3 More Russian Locations in U.S. Shuttered

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Putin promises retaliation in growing diplomatic feud with US

Russian President Vladimir Putin plans to retaliate against the State Department’s latest rebuke of his policies, his spokesman warned.

“We regret the unconstructive stance taken by our counterparts in the United States and, of course, we cannot afford to leave unfriendly, and sometimes hostile steps towards us without retaliation,” Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said Thursday, according to state-run media.

That statement suggests that the diplomatic feud will escalate following the State Department’s decision to close three Russian facilities in the United States. Secretary of State Rex Tillerson’s team justified that move as a response to Putin’s requirement that the United States cut hundreds of personnel operating in Russia. But the State Department called for an end to the tit-for-tat, saying that the two sides had reached “parity” in the fight.

Tillerson ordered the closure of Russia’s consulate general in San Francisco, as well as two other facilities in New York and Washington, D.C., respectively.

“While there will continue to be a disparity in the number of diplomatic and consular annexes, we have chosen to allow the Russian government to maintain some of its annexes in an effort to arrest the downward spiral of our relationship,” State Department spokeswoman Heather Nauert said Thursday.

The State Department said it had implemented the Putin team’s order to remove hundreds of U.S. personnel from Russia. Putin issued that requirement in response to Congress passing legislation that sanctions Russia on three fronts: the cyberattacks against the Democratic party and state election systems in 2016; the invasion of Ukraine; and Russia’s support for Syrian President Bashar Assad.

“The United States hopes that, having moved toward the Russian Federation’s desire for parity, we can avoid further retaliatory actions by both sides and move forward to achieve the stated down of both of our presidents: improved relations between our two countries and increased cooperation on areas of mutual concern,” Nauert said.

Russian diplomats maintain that the United States is to blame for the strained ties between the former Cold War rivals. “By tradition we are for good-natured relations with the United States,” Peskov said. “Moreover, we believe that these relations must be advanced in the interests of peace and global stability and in the interests of settling crucial world and regional problems.”

*** Meanwhile, this Dmitry Peskov cat is well know to the Trump orbit and described below.

Moscow (CNN) Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov confirmed Wednesday he got an email from Michael Cohen, US President Donald Trump’s lawyer, asking for help moving a Moscow real estate deal forward, but said he did not respond and did not pass it to Russian President Vladimir Putin.

Peskov was responding to a question from CNN on a conference call with reporters.
Cohen — who was executive vice president of the Trump Organization at the time he sent the email — said Monday that he had contacted the Kremlin for assistance in mid-January 2016 about building a Trump Tower in Moscow when the mogul was running for president, but denied that the project was related to Trump’s campaign. But the revelation appears to contradict Trump’s vehement denials of any such business connections to Russia in the past.
Cohen told CNN on Monday his message to Peskov was “an email that went unanswered that was solely regarding a real estate deal and nothing more.”
Peskov confirmed that his office had located a copy of the email, which said the development deal wasn’t moving forward and requested support.

 

The Crash of MH17, a Case Still Being Pursued

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Putin reminded Oliver Stone about the “Spanish dispatcher” in answering the question about the crash of MH17: for the full article, go here but you will need to translate.

Suspects in the downing of Malaysian airlines flight MH17 in eastern Ukraine in 2014, in which all 298 people aboard were killed, will be tried in a Dutch court and under Dutch law, the Netherlands’ foreign ministry. 

Victims of the disaster, which occurred over territory held by pro-Russia separatists fighting Ukrainian government forces, came from 17 countries, and included 196 Dutch citizens.

The Dutch Safety Board, which investigated the cause of the crash, concluded in October 2015 that the plane was shot down by a Russian-made ground-to-air rocket.

Moscow, which denies any involvement in the fighting in eastern Ukraine, also denies one of its rockets could have been used against MH17. More here.

Photo

Memo on MH17 info exchange between Ukraine, Netherlands to help Kyiv sue Russia

Ukraine and the Netherlands will soon sign a memorandum on the exchange of information on the case of Boeing 777 flight MH17 shot down in 2014, which will help Kyiv in its lawsuit against Russia, Deputy Foreign Minister Olena Zerkal said.

“The Dutch do not want the work done to be questioned. We are now working on signing a memorandum on the exchange of information, since the downed Boeing is part of our lawsuit against Russia regarding the financing of terrorism, namely the supply of weapons which destroyed this aircraft,” Zerkal said on the air of Channel 5 on Wednesday.

At the same time, the Deputy Foreign Minister added: “We are already at the final stage of signing this memorandum.”

As reported, Ukrainian Justice Minister Pavlo Petrenko and Dutch Minister of Security and Justice Stef Blok signed a bilateral agreement on international legal cooperation on criminal matters relating to the 2014 crash of a Malaysia Airlines Boeing.

The Dutch government noted that a bilateral treaty with Ukraine allows for the prosecution of those responsible for the death of all 298 victims from 17 countries, not just Dutch citizens. “The agreement envisages that prosecution of suspects in the downed MH17 flight will be for all 298 people killed in the crash. This gives all relatives equal rights in the Dutch process,” the report said.

In addition, the agreement gives an opportunity to question Ukrainian suspects via a video linkup with the Netherlands. “The issue of the potential transfer of convicts has also been settled, which is important, because the Ukrainian Constitution does not allow extradition of its citizens,” the report says.

As reported, the Boeing 777 belonging to Malaysia Airlines flying from Amsterdam to Kuala Lumpur (Malaysia) was shot out of the sky killing all 298 passengers on board.

The international joint investigatory group (Joint Investigation Team, JIT), which is comprised of prosecutors and law-enforcement officials from Ukraine, the Netherlands, Belgium, Australia, and Malaysia, as well as EU legal officials, on September 28, 2016 presented its findings in the criminal investigation of the tragedy.

“The JIT concluded that MH17 was downed by a rocket, Series 9M38, launched from a self-propelled ground-to-missile launcher BUK-TELAR, in a farming area in the region of Pervomaiske village. The area is currently held by pro-Russian militant groups. Investigators said missile complex was delivered to Ukraine from the Russian Federation and returned there after the downing,” the findings said.

In early June 2017, the British investigative journalists group Bellingcat said it found a photo of the Buk 323 missile launcher of the Russian 53rd anti-aircraft missile brigade taken before the launcher was used to down the MH17 passenger flight in Donetsk region in 2014.

In mid-November 2016, Malaysian Transport Minister Liow Tiong Lai said that investigators had established the names of a hundred individuals suspected of involvement in the crime and that they will be named in 2017.

Representatives of the countries cooperating in the inquiry into this crash – the Netherlands, Australia, Malaysia, Ukraine and Belgium agreed that the cases against suspects in the case on the downing of the MH17 flight are planned to be considered in the Netherlands under the Dutch law.

World’s Wealthiest Saying No to Jared

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It could be that the Forbes list of the richest in the world is on the top of Kushner’s desk and others are working the phones. When payments are due in the billion dollar range comes due within months, panic sets in when there are no prospects to meet that demand.

Some of these foreign trips made by Kushner have dual purposes such that they are labeled and envoys where they are contrary to State Department diplomatic operations and Secretary of State Tillerson is working to terminate on the fly envoys that are not coordinated with the agency’s personnel.

‘Jared Kushner, Donald Trump’s son-in-law and top adviser, wakes up each morning to a growing problem that will not go away. His family’s real estate business, Kushner Cos., owes hundreds of millions of dollars on a 41-story office building on Fifth Avenue. It has failed to secure foreign investors, despite an extensive search, and its resources are more limited than generally understood. As a result, the company faces significant challenges.

Over the past two years, executives and family members have sought substantial overseas investment from previously undisclosed places: South Korea’s sovereign-wealth fund, France’s richest man, Israeli banks and insurance companies, and exploratory talks with a Saudi developer, according to former and current executives. These were in addition to previously reported attempts to raise money in China and Qatar.

Jared Kushner
Photographer: Andrew Harrer / Bloomberg via Getty Images

The family, once one of the largest landlords on the East Coast, sold thousands of apartments to finance its purchase of the tower in 2007 and has borrowed extensively for other purchases. They are walking away from a Brooklyn hotel once considered central to their plans for an office hub. From other properties, they are extracting cash, including tens of millions in borrowed funds from the recently acquired former New York Times building. What’s more, their partner in the Fifth Avenue building, Vornado Realty Trust, headed by Steve Roth, has stood aside, allowing the Kushners to pursue financing on their own.

Kushner Cos. says it will prevail. Laurent Morali, the president, said the company has a variety of contingency plans for the building and its broader portfolio will allow it to sustain any setback. He said he is encouraged by the interest of several potential investors, but declined to name them.

“Reports that portray it as a distressed situation are just not accurate for the building or for the company,” Morali said in an interview on the 15th floor of the building, 666 Fifth Avenue.

But there are challenges all around. The mortgage on their tower is due in 18 months. This has led to concerns that Kushner could use—or has perhaps already used—his official position to prop up the family business despite having divested to close relatives his ownership in many projects to conform with government ethics requirements. Federal investigators are examining Kushner’s finances and business dealings, along with those of other Trump associates, as they probe possible collusion between the Kremlin and the Trump campaign. Kushner has already testified twice before closed congressional committees and denies mixing family business with his official role.

This article, which describes new details of the company’s troubled finances and its overseas fundraising efforts, is based on a review of thousands of pages of financial documents and interviews with more than two dozen executives, business partners, real estate agents, deal participants and analysts. They spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss private deals. Some feared legal reprisals or other retaliation from one of the country’s most powerful families.

The portrait that emerges is that of a real estate company established by a pair of penniless Holocaust survivors, its extraordinary expansion by their children, the rise of a grandson to a top White House role and a big bet that has complicated its financial future.

It was 2006—the height of the real-estate market boom—when Kushner Cos. agreed to buy 666 Fifth Avenue for $1.8 billion, then a record for a Manhattan building. All of it was borrowed except for $50 million. The company still holds half of a $1.2 billion mortgage, on which it hasn’t paid a cent. The full amount is due in February 2019.

The strain has become increasingly evident across their holdings. One person familiar with the company’s finances describes the tower, with its low ceilings and outdated floor plan, as the Jenga puzzle piece that could set the empire teetering.

Continue the long read here with graphics to understand the names, the travels, this history and why Robert Mueller is investigating some of the connective tissue going beyond the Russian bank(s) and where some criminal activity is being investigated.’

Venezuela: Bribery, Corruption to Giving Away Their Children

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As Venezuelans die on the streets, U.N. Human Rights Council remains mum

The Geneva-based UNHRC, whose job is to “uphold the highest standards” of human rights across the world, has not issued one single resolution about Venezuela, nor convened any urgent session to discuss the crisis there, nor called for any inquiry into the deaths of protesters by armed government-backed mobs. More here.
Corruption and Bribery
During the relevant time period, ODEBRECHT, together with its co-conspirators, paid approximately $788 million in bribes in association with more than 100 projects in twelve
countries, including Angola, Argentina, Brazil, Columbia, Dominican Republic, Ecuador, Guatemala, Mexico, Mozambique, Panama, Peru, and Venezuela. Read more here as a part of this case is defined by the U.S. Justice Department due to several associated persons were located in New York and Miami. 
It is a global cascade of corruption where none other than Nicolas Maduro of Venezuela is a player in the scandal.

For years, Latin America’s construction giant, Odebrecht, built some of the region’s most crucial infrastructure projects.

Now it is becoming well-known for another superlative: it is involved in one of the biggest corruption cases in history.

Last year, the Brazilian-based group signed what has been described as the world’s largest leniency deal with US and Swiss authorities, in which it confessed to corruption and paid $2.6bn (£2.1bn) in fines.

Seventy-seven company executives have agreed to plea bargains with Brazilian authorities, and their statements to investigators are being made public. More here from BBC.

***  

A day after President Nicolas Maduro said he would seek an international arrest warrant against her, Venezuela’s sacked chief prosecutor accused him of corruption, Business Insider reported on Wednesday.

Luisa Ortega Díaz Luisa Ortega 

(Photo: Cancillería del Ecuador, CC BY-SA 2.0)

“I want to denounce, in front of the world, a grave situation in Venezuela: that of excessive corruption,” Luisa Ortega said at a press conference in Brazil.

She claimed she had evidence that President Maduro and Socialist Party titans such as Diosdado Cabello and Jorge Rodriguez have ties to the Odebrecht scandal.Additional summary here.

If you wonder where much of the wealth of Venezuela has gone due to being one of the most richest nations due to oil reserves, look no further  than what the banks across the globe may know. Ortega Díaz also said authorities in Switzerland requested information regarding the accounts of several Venezuelan officials over alleged links to the bribes, including a list of all Venezuelans who received deposits from Odebrecht directly or indirectly.

The world is an ugly place where peril is a human condition in 2017. World leaders offer feeble attempts to regain some kind of balance, when it comes to Venezuela, a large country in the Western hemisphere, humanity fails humanity.

Much of the population in Venezuela has been suffering beyond the scope of what media reports. Here is a sad example:

Giving away their children…

Struggling to feed herself and her seven children, Venezuelan mother Zulay Pulgar asked a neighbor in October to take over care of her six-year-old daughter, a victim of a pummeling economic crisis.

The family lives on Pulgar’s father’s pension, worth $6 a month at the black market rate, in a country where prices for many basic goods are surpassing those in the United States.

“It’s better that she has another family than go into prostitution, drugs or die of hunger,” the 43-year-old unemployed mother said, sitting outside her dilapidated home with her five-year-old son, father and unemployed husband.

With average wages less than the equivalent of $50 a month at black market rates, three local councils and four national welfare groups all confirmed an increase in parents handing children over to the state, charities or friends and family.

The government does not release data on the number of parents giving away their children and welfare groups struggle to compile statistics given the ad hoc manner in which parents give away children and local councils collate figures.

Still, the trend highlights Venezuela’s fraying social fabric and the heavy toll that a deep recession and soaring inflation are taking on the country with the world’s largest oil reserves.

Showing photos of her family looking plumper just a year ago, Pulgar said just one chicken meal would now burn up half its monthly income. Breakfast is often just bread and coffee, with rice alone for both lunch and dinner.

Nancy Garcia, the 54-year-old neighbor who took in the girl, Pulgar’s second-youngest child, works in a grocery store and has five children of her own. She said she could not bear to see Pulgar’s child going without food.

“My husband, my children and I teach her to behave, how to study, to dress, to talk… She now calls me ’mom’ and my husband ’dad,’” said Garcia.

ABANDONED

In some cases, parents are simply abandoning their kids.

Last month, a baby boy was found inside a bag in a relatively wealthy area of Caracas and a malnourished one-year-old boy was found abandoned in a cardboard box in the eastern city of Ciudad Guayana, local media reported.

Gil said that she had helped find places in orphanages for two newborns recently abandoned by their mothers in hospitals after birth. More here from Reuters.