Category Archives: The Denise Simon Experience

What the Uranium One Documents Reveal

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Our Operations

Uranium One is engaged through its subsidiaries and joint ventures in uranium production, and in the exploration and development of uranium properties, in Kazakhstan, the United States, Tanzania and elsewhere. Uranium One is focused on low cost and low technical risk operations, with existing, near and medium-term production visibility in some of the world’s largest uranium resource jurisdictions.

Uranium One is a joint venture partner with JSC NAC Kazatomprom, the Kazakhstan state-owned atomic energy company, in six major producing uranium mines in Kazakhstan – Akdala, South Inkai, Karatau, Akbastau, Zarechnoye and Kharasan. The company also operates the Willow Creek uranium mine in Wyoming, and is the operator of, and owns a 13.9 percent interest in, the Mkuju River uranium development project in Tanzania.

Uranium One’s revenues are largely derived from the sale of uranium concentrates. The company sells its uranium to major nuclear utilities in Russia, Europe, North America, South America, Middle East and Asia.

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This was an internal coup advanced by the Obama administration. What is worse, where are those Hillary, State Department of CFIUS or White House related emails?

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William Campbell, the FBI informant, documented for his FBI handlers the first illegal activity by Russians nuclear industry officials in fall 2009, nearly a entire year before the Russian state-owned Rosatom nuclear firm won Obama administration approval for the Uranium One deal, the memos show.

Evidence gathered by an FBI undercover informant conflicts with several media reports as well as statements by Justice officials concerning the connections between a Russian nuclear bribery case and the Obama administration’s approval of the sale of uranium One to Russia’s state-owned Rosatom nuclear company. More here.

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During Campbell’s time working as a confidential informant, he was required by the Russians to launder large sums of money to financial institutions in Cyprus, Latvia and Seychelles. With Campbell’s help the FBI uncovered an extensive money Russian nuclear money laundering apparatus and Campbell was working solo. He was required to launder money, from his own salary, on particular days and times when Russian money handlers would be working at the banks. If he missed a scheduled pay time for any reason his Russian counterparts would threaten him, he told his attorney. He was also required on many occasions to deliver cash directly to those who were being paid off, most of which he recorded on hidden cameras for the FBI.

It didn’t end there. In order to keep his cover he spent many nights with his Russian counterparts drinking, collecting information and more importantly gaining their trust. He was in his early 60s and his once unblemished driving record ended with a DUI in 2008 and two other reckless driving charges in 2010 and 2012, said Toensing, who noted they were all misdemeanors.

THE PLAYERS

The cast of characters deep within the Russian nuclear agency also included another American businessman named Rod Fisk, whose company Transportation Logistics International, also known as TLI,  was the primary transport company for Russian enriched uranium sold to the United States.

Fisk passed away in 2011, and his Vice President Daren Condrey replaced him. In 2015, Daren Condrey, of Maryland, pleaded guilty to conspiring to violate the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act (FCPA) and conspiring to commit wire fraud, according to the DOJ.

Adding to the colorful array of Russian criminals the FBI was watching, was a Russian national named Vadim Mikerin. He was then a top official of the Russian nuclear arms subsidiary Tenex. Mikerin, who had close ties to elite members of the Kremlin, and who bragged in emails and documents about his families connections to current Russian President Vladimir Putin, would later become president of Tenam, the American subsidiary that began operations in 2010, according to the contract. Boris Rubizhevsky, another Russian national from New Jersey,  who was  president of the security firm NEXGEN Security, also pleaded guilty in 2015, to conspiracy to commit money laundering.  He served as a consultant to TENAM and to Mikerin. He was sentenced to prison last week along with three years of supervised release and a $26,500 fine, according to a recent Reuters report.

Mikerin was eventually arrested for a racketeering scheme that dated back to 2004, and included fraud, extortion and money laundering. But he only plead guilty to money-laundering. He was sentenced to 48 months in prison in December 2015. More here.

Vadim Mikerin (image from flickr.com by Tenam USA) / Flickr

 

Here are five revelations from those documents reviewed by The Hill:

Russia saw its purchase of Uranium One as part of a strategy to dominate global uranium markets, including making the United States more dependent on Moscow’s nuclear fuel.

Documents the informant gave the FBI clearly show that the purchase of Uranium One was seen by Russia and its American consultants as one tool in a strategy to “control” the uranium market worldwide. In the United States, that strategy focused on securing billions of new uranium contracts to create a new reliance on Russian nuclear fuel just as the Cold War-era Megatons to Megawatts program was ending.

Uranium One did export some of its U.S. uranium ore.

News organizations, including The Washington Post, continue to report none of Uranium One’s product left the U.S. after Russia took control. In fact, the Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) approved an export license for a third party trucking firm to export Uranium One ore to Canada for enrichment, and that some of that uranium ended up in Europe, NRC memos show. Uranium One itself admits that as much as 25 percent of the uranium it exported to Canada ended up with European or Asian clients through what is know in the industry as “book transfers.”

The FBI informant Douglas Campbell does have information to share with Congress about Rosatom’s Uranium One purchase.

Justice officials have suggested in recent stories that Campbell has little on Uranium One because his work forced on nuclear bribery involving a different Rosatom subsidiary. While it’s true Campbell’s undercover work focused on criminality inside the Rosatom subsidiary Tenex, he did gather extensive documents about Rosatom’s efforts to win approval to buy Uranium One.

The FBI did have evidence that Rosatom officials were engaged in criminality well before the Obama administration approved Rosatom’s purchase of Uranium One.

Evidence that a foreign company is involved in criminality can disqualify it from Committee on Foreign Investment in the United States (CFIUS) approval to buy a sensitive U.S. asset. And Campbell helped the FBI recorded the first criminal activity by Rosatom officials inside its Tenex arm in November 2009, nearly an entire year before CFIUS approved Rosatom’s purchase of Uranium One.

Justice officials trusted the informant Campbell enough to keep him working undercover for six years and to pay him more than $51,000 once the convictions were secured.

A check obtained by The Hill shows the FBI paid Campbell an informant fee of more than $51,000 in January 2016, shortly after the last convictions in the Russian nuclear bribery case were made.

Counterfeit Operations, Iran and North Korea

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It is a globally business and a nasty one.

U.S. officials have long accused Iran of supplying arms to rebel Houthi forces battling for control of Yemen. But Monday’s sanctions help highlight the scope of what Western officials commonly describe as the IRGC’s far-reaching and malign activities.

“Iran itself, together with its proxy, Lebanese Hezbollah, is knee-deep and has been knee-deep in the counterfeit business for quite some time,” said Matthew Levitt with the Washington Institute for Near East Policy. “Exposing this is kind of a two-for one, both exposing the organization’s terrorist activity and also exposing the nature of the criminal activity that it engages in.” More here.

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Treasury Designates Large-Scale IRGC-QF Counterfeiting Ring

11/20/2017

Iranian Network Prints Counterfeit Yemeni Bank Notes for IRGC-Qods Force

WASHINGTON – Today, the U.S. Department of the Treasury’s Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC) designated a network of individuals and entities involved in a large-scale scheme to help Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps-Qods Force (IRGC-QF) counterfeit currency to support its destabilizing activities.  This network employed deceptive measures to circumvent European export control restrictions and procured advanced equipment and materials to print counterfeit Yemeni bank notes potentially worth hundreds of millions of dollars for the IRGC-QF.  The IRGC-QF was designated pursuant to the global terrorism Executive Order (E.O.) 13224.

“This scheme exposes the deep levels of deception the IRGC-Qods Force is willing to employ against companies in Europe, governments in the Gulf, and the rest of the world to support its destabilizing activities.  Counterfeiting strikes at the heart of the international financial system, and the fact that elements of the government of Iran are involved in this behavior is completely unacceptable,” said Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin.  “This counterfeiting scheme exposes the serious risks faced by anyone doing business with Iran, as the IRGC continues to obscure its involvement in Iran’s economy and hide behind the façade of legitimate businesses to perpetrate its nefarious objectives.”

Reza Heidari and Pardazesh Tasvir Rayan Co.

Reza Heidari (Heidari) is being designated today for having acted for or on behalf of the IRGC-QF and having assisted in, sponsored, or provided financial, material, or technological support for, or financial or other services to or in support of, the IRGC-QF.

Pardavesh Tasvir Rayan Co. (Rayan Printing) is being designated today for being controlled by Heidari; for having acted for or on behalf of the IRGC-QF; having assisted, sponsored, or provided financial, material, or technological support for, or financial or other services to or in support of, the IRGC-QF; and being owned by Tejarat Almas Mobin Holding, another Iranian company also being designated today.

Heidari played a key role in procuring secure printing equipment and materials for the IRGC-QF in support of the group’s currency counterfeiting scheme.  Heidari served as the managing director of Iran-based Rayan Printing, a company involved in printing counterfeit Yemeni rial bank notes potentially worth hundreds of millions of dollars for the IRGC-QF, as of late 2016.  Heidari used front companies to obfuscate the actual end user and facilitate deceptive transactions when dealing with European suppliers of secure printing equipment and materials.

ForEnt Technik and Printing Trade Center

ForEnt Technik GmbH is being designated today for being owned or controlled by Heidari, while Printing Trade Center GmbH (PTC) is being designated for having acted for or on behalf of, and assisted in, sponsored, or provided financial, material, or technological support for, or financial or other services to or in support of, Heidari.

Heidari used German-based ForEnt Technik GmbH and PTC as front companies to deceive European suppliers, circumvent export restrictions, and acquire advanced printing machinery, security printing machinery, and raw materials in support of the IRGC-QF’s counterfeit currency capabilities.  These raw materials included watermarked paper and specialty inks from European suppliers.  Heidari is the Managing Director and sole shareholder of ForEnt Technik Gmbh.

Mahmoud Seif and Tejarat Almas Mobin

Mahmoud Seif is being designated today for having assisted, sponsored, or provided financial, material, or technological support for, or other services to or in support of, the IRGC-QF.  Tejarat Almas Mobin Holding is being designated today for being controlled by Seif.

Seif is the managing director of Tejarat Almas Mobin, the parent company of Rayan Printing.  Heidari and Seif coordinated on the procurement of raw supplies and equipment that enabled the IRGC-QF counterfeiting capabilities.  Seif was involved with the logistics of importing materials for the counterfeiting project into Iran.  Additionally, Seif has previously been involved in the procurement of weapons for the IRGC-QF.

For identifying information on the individuals and entities listed today, click here: https://www.treasury.gov/resource-center/sanctions/OFAC-Enforcement/Pages/20171120.aspx

*** So, did Iran teach North Korea to counterfeit or was it the other way around? North Korea has been counterfeiting and participating in illicit activities going back decades. North Korea is not especially fretful over the newly applied sanctions or being listed again as a terror state by President Trump. While it should be done, the regime has proven methods to finesse the system.

Ri Jong Ho had simply had enough. He’d seen too many executions.

Ri, a high-profile North Korean defector, spent years working for what is essentially a slush fund for one of the most notorious regimes on the planet, Kim Jong Un and his compatriots.
Life was good. Ri helped bring in somewhere between $50 million and $100 million for North Korean elites, and was handsomely rewarded with luxuries most North Koreans couldn’t dream of in years past: a car, a color TV and some extra cash on the side, once rarities in the communist state but more commonplace now in the capital, Pyongyang.
But he watched the regime kill his peers and their families, even children.
“It was not just high level officers, officials, but their families, their children (and) their followers,” Ri told CNN in his first interview to a major US broadcast network. “It was not just once or twice a year — it was ongoing throughout the year, thousands of people being executed or purged.”
Ri said the final straw came in late 2013, when Kim Jong Un executed his own uncle, Jang Song Thaek, with an anti-aircraft gun.
“It was a cruel and crude method of execution,” he said. “After all these years living in the socialist system, I never witnessed anything like that.”
Ri was living in China at the time, and in 2014 was able to safely defect with his family.
And just like that, Kim lost one of his top money makers.

Office 39

Ri said he worked for decades in what’s known as “Office 39.”
The office is in charge of bringing in hard currency for the regime. Ri calls it a “slush fund for the leader and the leadership.”
Ri told CNN “Office 39” is not engaged in illicit activities, but the US Treasury Department says otherwise.
The US government accused the office of engaging in “illicit economic activities” to support the North Korean government. It has branches throughout the nation that raise and manage funds and is responsible for earning foreign currency for North Korea’s Korean Workers’ Party senior leadership through illicit activities such as narcotics trafficking.
North Korea has been accused of crimes like hacking banks, counterfeiting currency, dealing drugs and even trafficking endangered species.
Workers who help bring in cash for the regime are granted access to the outside world — especially China — in order to establish networks that are crucial to making money, analysts say. They often have diplomatic privileges that allow them to evade their host country’s domestic laws, experts say.
Ri said he was not involved in illegal activities and that they were not under the purview of Office 39, but did not deny they occurred. He said much of North Korea’s hard cash is earned through exporting labor — the country sends workers across the globe and collects much of their pay, according to the UN — and exporting natural resources like coal, which China used to buy but has since stopped.
Illicit activities make a lot of money, though. The Congressional Research Service estimated in 2008 that North Korea could earn anywhere from $500 million to $1 billion from these types of illicit activities.
That money helps fund the lavish lifestyles of the North Korean elites while sanctions limit the country’s ability to make money. That keeps North Korea’s leadership happy and helps Kim prevent coup attempts, analysts say.
“They (North Korean leaders) are focused on maintaining their ruling power, and they are working on making this dynasty-like system lasting for a long time,” Ri said. “So instead of focusing on their economic development or better life, they are more focused on maintaining their system.
Some of Office 39’s profits also go to the country’s nuclear and missile programs, which crossed an important threshold this month with the testing of two intercontinental ballistic missiles, weapons that experts say likely put the United States homeland in North Korea’s range.
CNN reached out to the North Korean mission at the United Nations for a response to the interview with Ri. An official at the mission said Ri was lying to “make money and save his own life.”

‘Hundreds of fishing boats’

Analysts say Office 39 is likely now in the cross hairs of US President Donald Trump’s administration.
The Trump team has made it clear that one of the ways it plans to deal with North Korea is to squeeze its revenue streams across the globe in order to pressure them into negotiations over their weapons programs.
Who speaks for the United States on North Korea? Contradictions emerge
Ri is not sure if the tactic will work, as he says it’s easy to side-step sanctions and believes the international community has made strategic mistakes that could come back to bite them.
North Korean companies can just change their names once sanctioned, he says. North Korean leaders don’t keep much money abroad, so the sanctions against them are pointless, according to Ri. Smugglers are difficult to catch.
“Smuggling is conducted by any and every means you could imagine. Mostly larger items are done using ships, for example by filing a cargo list … where what’s written on the (list) is different from what is really being shipped,” he said. “On the open sea, the Yellow Sea, there are hundreds of fishing boats — both from China and North Korea — and all the smuggling is done by these so-called fishing boats.

Going after China

Ri believes that secondary sanctions — targeting those who do business with North Korea, like the United States did to China’s Bank of Dandong in June — is the way to go, especially in China.
Beijing accounts for about 85% of North Korean imports in 2015, according to UN data, though Ri revealed that Pyongyang does import some oil from Russia.
North Korean economist Ri Gi Song told CNN in February that China accounts for 70% of trade and that trade with Russia is increasing. More here from CNN.

Sexual Harassment: Hollywood, Media, Government

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Well, Al Franken has another accuser then we have Charlie Rose and now John Conyers…sheesh this redefines draining the swamp.

When will the Washington Post or CNN advance the Senator Menendez case?

The young woman wrote that she was recruited as an escort from an adult escort service called the Doll Palace, and that the code word “chocolate” would summon her and other girls to Melgen’s sex parties. She offered specific recollections of Melgen’s preferred pimp, the homes where she slept with his house guests for money, and the phone number her calls would come from.

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Her account of the sex parties Menendez allegedly attended in the Dominican Republic is the most detailed to surface since TheDC first began reporting on the story in November.

She told her story to a tipster who forwarded the email to CREW; it was not included with the cache of documents he published online on Jan. 24. TheDC was first to report on that dossier about Sen. Menendez, which included an interview transcript in which a different women claimed she was 16 when she began sleeping with him.

That young prostitute said she had sex with Menendez “three times at least” in 2009. “The first one in February, and then in May and June. I recall his visit in June so well because that month was my 17th birthday.” More here.

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Television host Charlie Rose has been accused by a slew of women of sexual misconduct spanning decades.

The 75-year-old face of “CBS This Morning” and the PBS program “Charlie Rose” joins disgraced producer Harvey Weinstein, comedian Louis C.K., Kevin Spacey and a host of entertainers in a widening cultural sex scandal.

The news was first reported Monday by The Washington Post in an exposé involving dozens of men and women who worked on “Charlie Rose.”

The newspaper said eight women — three of them named — gave details that indicate a modus operandi for putting women in awkward sexual situations.

A trend among the women who spoke to the Post includes:

  • Mr. Rose would allegedly grab new employees by the leg to “gauge” their reactions.
  • Mr. Rose would invite women to work at his home.
  • Mr. Rose allegedly walked around naked once women entered his home.
  • Mr. Rose allegedly called women to share sexual fantasies.

Read more here.

Many have asked about what lawmakers were part of the $15-18 million payoff(s) in Congress. Okay…one name is John Conyers. What is worse is taxpayer dollars were used to pay for airfare….WHAT?

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She Said That A Powerful Congressman Harassed Her. Here’s Why You Didn’t Hear Her Story.

“When you make private settlements, it doesn’t warn the next woman or the next person going into that situation.”

Michigan Rep. John Conyers, a Democrat and the longest-serving member of the House of Representatives, settled a wrongful dismissal complaint in 2015 with a former employee who alleged she was fired because she would not “succumb to [his] sexual advances.”

Documents from the complaint obtained by BuzzFeed News include four signed affidavits, three of which are notarized, from former staff members who allege that Conyers, the ranking Democrat on the powerful House Judiciary Committee, repeatedly made sexual advances to female staff that included requests for sexual favors, contacting and transporting other women with whom they believed Conyers was having affairs, caressing their hands sexually, and rubbing their legs and backs in public. Four people involved with the case verified the documents are authentic.

And the documents also reveal the secret mechanism by which Congress has kept an unknown number of sexual harassment allegations secret: A grinding, closely held process that left the alleged victim feeling, she told BuzzFeed News, that she had no option other than to stay quiet and accept a settlement offered to her.

“I was basically blackballed. There was nowhere I could go,” she said in a phone interview. BuzzFeed News is withholding the woman’s name at her request, because she said she fears retribution.

Last week the Washington Post reported that the office paid out $17 million for 264 settlements with federal employees over 20 years for various violations, including sexual harassment. The Conyers documents, however, give a glimpse into the inner workings of the Office of Compliance, which has for decades concealed episodes of sexual abuse by powerful political figures

The woman who settled with Conyers launched the complaint in 2014 with Congress’s Office of Compliance alleging that she was fired for refusing his sexual advances and ended up facing a daunting process that ended with a confidentiality agreement in exchange for a settlement of more than $27,000. Her settlement, however, came from Conyers’ office budget rather than the designated fund for settlements.

Congress has no human resources department. Instead, congressional employees have 180 days to report a sexual harassment incident to the Office of Compliance, which then leads to a lengthy process involves counseling, mediation, and requires the signing of a confidentiality agreement before a complaint can go forward.

After this, an employee can choose to take the matter to federal district court, but another avenue is available: an administrative hearing, after which a negotiation and settlement may follow.

Via documentcloud.org

Some members of Congress have raised major concerns with the current system over the years, but the calls for an overhaul have grown louder in the post-Weinstein era. Members have argued that 90 days is too long to make a person continue working in the same environment with their harasser; that interns and fellows should be eligible to pursue complaints through this process; and that it is unfair for a victim to have to pay for legal representation while the office of the harasser is represented for free by the House’s counsel.

In this case, one of Conyers’ former employees was offered a settlement, in exchange for her silence, that would be paid out of Conyers’ taxpayer-funded office budget. His office would “rehire” the woman as a “temporary employee” despite her being directed not to come into the office or do any actual work, according to the document. The complainant would receive a total payment of $27,111.75 over the three months, after which point she would be removed from the payroll, according to the document.

Via documentcloud.org

The draft agreement viewed by BuzzFeed News was unsigned, but congressional employment records match the timing and amounts outlined in the document. The woman left the office and never went public with her story.

The process was “disgusting,” said Matthew Peterson, who worked as a law clerk representing the complainant, and who listed as a signatory to some of the documents.

“It is a designed cover-up,” said Peterson, who declined to discuss details of the case but agreed to characterize it in general terms. “You feel like they were betrayed by their government just for coming forward. It’s like being abused twice.”

Other lawyers named as representing the accuser could not be reached for comment. The Office of Compliance did not confirm or deny that they had dealt with the case.

“Pursuant to the Congressional Accountability Act, the OOC cannot comment on whether matters have or have not been filed with the office,” Laura Cech, publications and outreach manager of the Office of Compliance, told BuzzFeed News in an email when asked to comment on this case.

Two staffers alleged in their signed affidavits that Conyers used congressional resources to fly in women they believed he was having affairs with. Another said she was tasked with driving women to and from Conyers’ apartment and hotel rooms.

Rep. Conyers did not admit fault as part of the settlement. His office did not respond to multiple requests for comment on Monday.

The documents were first provided to BuzzFeed News by Mike Cernovich, the men’s rights figure turned pro-Trump media activist who propagated a number of false conspiracy theories including the “Pizzagate” conspiracy. Cernovich said he gave the documents to BuzzFeed News for vetting and further reporting, and because he said if he published them himself, Democrats and congressional leaders would “try to discredit the story by attacking the messenger.” He provided them without conditions. BuzzFeed News independently confirmed the authenticity of the documents with four people directly involved with the case, including the accuser.

In her complaint, the former employee said Conyers repeatedly asked her for sexual favors and often asked her to join him in a hotel room. On one occasion, she alleges that Conyers asked her to work out of his room for the evening, but when she arrived the congressman started talking about his sexual desires. She alleged he then told her she needed to “touch it,” in reference to his penis, or find him a woman who would meet his sexual demands.

She alleged Conyers made her work nights, evenings, and holidays to keep him company.

In another incident, the former employee alleged the congressman insisted she stay in his room while they traveled together for a fundraising event. When she told him that she would not stay with him, she alleged he told her to “just cuddle up with me and caress me before you go.”

“Rep. Conyers strongly postulated that the performing of personal service or favors would be looked upon favorably and lead to salary increases or promotions,” the former employee said in the documents.

Three other staff members provided affidavits submitted to the Office Of Compliance that outlined a pattern of behavior from Conyers that included touching the woman in a sexual manner and growing angry when she brought her husband around.

One affidavit from a former female employee states that she was tasked with flying in women for the congressman. “One of my duties while working for Rep. Conyers was to keep a list of women that I assumed he was having affairs with and call them at his request and, if necessary, have them flown in using Congressional resources,” said her affidavit. (A second staffer alleged in an interview that Conyers used taxpayer resources to fly women to him.)

The employee said in her affidavit that Conyers also made sexual advances toward her: “I was driving the Congressman in my personal car and was resting my hand on the stick shift. Rep. Conyers reached over and began to caress my hand in a sexual manner.”

The woman said she told Conyers she was married and not interested in pursuing a sexual relationship, according to the affidavit. She said she was told many times by constituents that it was well-known that Conyers had sexual relationships with his staff, and said she and other female staffers felt this undermined their credibility.

“I am personally aware of several women who have experienced the same or similar sexual advances made towards them by Rep[.] John Conyers,” she said in her affidavit.

A male employee wrote that he witnessed Rep. Conyers rub the legs and other body parts of the complainant “in what appeared to be a sexual manner” and saw the congressman rub and touch other women “in an inappropriate manner.” The employee said he confronted Conyers about this behavior.

“Rep. Conyers said he needed to be ‘more careful’ because bad publicity would not be helpful as he runs for re-election. He ended the conversation with me by saying he would ‘work on’ his behavior,” the male staffer said in his affidavit.

The male employee said that in 2011 Conyers complained a female staffer was “too old” and said he wanted to let her go. The employee said he set up a meeting in December 2011 to discuss “mistreatment of staff and his misuse of federal resources.” The affidavit says that Conyers “agreed that he would work on making improvements as long as I worked directly with him and stopped writing memos and emails about concerns.”

Another female employee also attested that she witnessed Conyer’s advances, and said she was asked to transport women to him. “I was asked on multiple occasions to pick up women and bring them to Mr. Conyers[‘] apartment, hotel rooms, etc.”

BuzzFeed News reached out to several former Conyers staffers, all of whom did not want to speak on the record. One former staffer, who did not want to be named, said she was frustrated by the secretive complaint process.

“I don’t think any allegations should be buried…and that’s for anyone, not just for this particular office, because it doesn’t really allow other people to see who these individuals are,” said the former staffer. “When you make private settlements, it doesn’t warn the next woman or the next person going into that situation.”

Another staffer said that Conyers’ reputation made people fearful to speak out against him. Aside from being the longest-serving House member and the ranking member of a powerful committee, Conyers is a civil rights icon. He was lauded by Martin Luther King Jr. and is a founding member of the Congressional Black Caucus.

“Your story won’t do shit to him,” said the staffer. “He’s untouchable.”

In a statement to BuzzFeed News, House Democratic Leader Nancy Pelosi said she was not aware of the settlement.

“The current process includes the signing of non-disclosure agreements by the parties involved. Congresswoman Jackie Speier has introduced legislation that will provide much-needed transparency on these agreements and make other critical reforms,” Pelosi said in the statement. “I strongly support her efforts.”

BuzzFeed News; Source: Office of Compliance

A spokesperson for John Boehner, who was the speaker of the House when the settlement was made, did not respond to a BuzzFeed News request for comment on Monday.

The documents also show that there was a belief among at least some staffers that the office was a jealous environment. Some of the documents allege Conyers offered his protection when staff would complain to him about management in the office.

California Democrat Rep. Speier and colleagues in the House and Senate have introduced legislation that would overhaul the complaint process, including requiring OOC to publicly name the office of any member who enters into a settlement. The bill would also allow complainants to waive mediation and counseling, set up a victims’ counsel, and require all congressional offices to go through harassment training every year.

Conyers’ office has a history of ethical run-ins. In 2016, his former chief of staff Cynthia Martin pleaded guilty to receiving stolen property after she refused to reimburse $16,500 that was mistakenly deposited in her account. A preliminary investigation by the Office of Congressional Ethics found that Conyers continued to pay Martin more than $13,000 per month when she was supposedly on unpaid leave.

In 2006, two former aides complained that Conyers made them babysit his children, run errands, and work on his reelection campaign while drawing their congressional salaries. There was also a bizarre incident in 2005 when 60 Thanksgiving turkeys, given to his staff to disperse to people, may have gone missing.

Conyers’ wife, former Detroit city councilor Monica Conyers, was sentenced to three years in prison over bribery charges in 2010. (One of the documents alleged Conyers began “aggressively acting out his sexual harassment behavior” following this.) Last year the couple renewed their vows. ●

 

 

Tillerson: Child Soldiers Conscription Violations

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The United Nations has a list of shame, fine but it is merely a list and a gesture.

Child soldiers are children (under 18) who are used for military purposes.

Some child soldiers are used for fighting – they’re forced to take part in wars and conflicts, forced to kill, and commit other acts of violence. Some are forced to act as suicide bombers. Some join ‘voluntarily’, driven by poverty, sense of duty, or circumstance.

Other children are used as cooks, porters, messengers, informants, spies or anything their commanders want them to do. Child soldiers are sometimes sexually abused.

Afghanistan, Central African Republic, Democratic Republic of Congo, India, Myanmar, the Occupied Palestinian Territory, Thailand, the UK and Yemen all use child soldiers, meaning on person under the age of 18. 

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Exclusive – State Dept. revolt: Tillerson accused of violating U.S. law on child soldiers

WASHINGTON (Reuters) – A group of about a dozen U.S. State Department officials have taken the unusual step of formally accusing Secretary of State Rex Tillerson of violating a federal law designed to stop foreign militaries from enlisting child soldiers, according to internal government documents reviewed by Reuters.

A confidential State Department “dissent” memo not previously reported said Tillerson breached the Child Soldiers Prevention Act when he decided in June to exclude Iraq, Myanmar, and Afghanistan from a U.S. list of offenders in the use of child soldiers. This was despite the department publicly acknowledging that children were being conscripted in those countries.[tmsnrt.rs/2jJ7pav]

Keeping the countries off the annual list makes it easier to provide them with U.S. military assistance. Iraq and Afghanistan are close allies in the fight against Islamist militants, while Myanmar is an emerging ally to offset China’s influence in Southeast Asia.

Documents reviewed by Reuters also show Tillerson’s decision was at odds with a unanimous recommendation by the heads of the State Department’s regional bureaus overseeing embassies in the Middle East and Asia, the U.S. envoy on Afghanistan and Pakistan, the department’s human rights office and its own in-house lawyers. [tmsnrt.rs/2Ah6tB4]

“Beyond contravening U.S. law, this decision risks marring the credibility of a broad range of State Department reports and analyses and has weakened one of the U.S. government’s primary diplomatic tools to deter governmental armed forces and government-supported armed groups from recruiting and using children in combat and support roles around the world,” said the July 28 memo.

Reuters reported in June that Tillerson had disregarded internal recommendations on Iraq, Myanmar and Afghanistan. The new documents reveal the scale of the opposition in the State Department, including the rare use of what is known as the “dissent channel,” which allows officials to object to policies without fear of reprisals.

The views expressed by the U.S. officials illustrate ongoing tensions between career diplomats and the former chief of Exxon Mobil Corp appointed by President Donald Trump to pursue an “America First” approach to diplomacy.

INTERPRETING THE LAW

The child soldiers law passed in 2008 states that the U.S. government must be satisfied that no children under the age of 18 “are recruited, conscripted or otherwise compelled to serve as child soldiers” for a country to be removed from the list. It currently includes the Democratic Republic of Congo, Nigeria, Somalia, South Sudan, Mali, Sudan, Syria and Yemen.

”The Secretary thoroughly reviewed all of the information presented to him and made a determination about whether the facts presented justified a listing pursuant to the law,” a State Department spokesperson said when asked about the officials’ allegation that he had violated the law.

In a written response to the dissent memo on Sept. 1, Tillerson adviser Brian Hook acknowledged that the three countries did use child soldiers. He said, however, it was necessary to distinguish between governments “making little or no effort to correct their child soldier violations … and those which are making sincere – if as yet incomplete – efforts.”

Hook made clear that America’s top diplomat used what he sees as his discretion to interpret the law.

‘A POWERFUL MESSAGE’

Foreign militaries on the list are prohibited from receiving aid, training and weapons from Washington unless the White House issues a waiver based on U.S. “national interest.” In 2016, under the Obama administration, both Iraq and Myanmar, as well as others such as Nigeria and Somalia, received waivers.

At times, the human rights community chided President Barack Obama for being too willing to issue waivers and exemptions, especially for governments that had security ties with Washington, instead of sanctioning more of those countries.

“Human Rights Watch frequently criticized President Barack Obama for giving too many countries waivers, but the law has made a real difference,” Jo Becker, advocacy director for the children’s rights division of Human Rights Watch, wrote in June in a critique of Tillerson’s decision.

The dissenting U.S. officials stressed that Tillerson’s decision to exclude Iraq, Afghanistan and Myanmar went a step further than the Obama administration’s waiver policy by contravening the law and effectively easing pressure on the countries to eradicate the use of child soldiers.

The officials acknowledged in the documents reviewed by Reuters that those three countries had made progress. But in their reading of the law, they said that was not enough to be kept off a list that has been used to shame governments into completely eradicating the use of child soldiers.

‘UNCONSCIONABLE ACTIONS’

Ben Cardin, ranking Democrat on the U.S. Senate Foreign Relations Committee, wrote to Tillerson on Friday saying there were “serious concerns that the State Department may not be complying” with the law and that the secretary’s decision “sent a powerful message to these countries that they were receiving a pass on their unconscionable actions.”

The memo was among a series of previously unreported documents sent this month to the Senate Foreign Relations Committee and the State Department’s independent inspector general’s office that relate to allegations that Tillerson violated the child soldiers law.

Legal scholars say that because of the executive branch’s latitude in foreign policy there is little legal recourse to counter Tillerson’s decision.

Herman Schwartz, a constitutional law professor at American University in Washington, said U.S. courts would be unlikely to accept any challenge to Tillerson’s interpretation of the child soldiers law as allowing him to remove a country from the list on his own discretion.

The signatories to the document were largely senior policy experts with years of involvement in the issues, said an official familiar with the matter. Reuters saw a copy of the document that did not include the names of those who signed it.

Tillerson’s decision to remove Iraq and Myanmar, formerly known as Burma, from the list and reject a recommendation by U.S. officials to add Afghanistan was announced in the release of the government’s annual human trafficking report on June 27.

Six days earlier, a previously unreported memo emailed to Tillerson from a range of senior diplomats said the three countries violated the law based on evidence gathered by U.S. officials in 2016 and recommended that he approve them for the new list.

It noted that in Iraq, the United Nations and non-governmental organizations “reported that some Sunni tribal forces … recruited and used persons younger than the age of 18, including instances of children taking a direct part in hostilities.”

Ali Kareem, who heads Iraq’s High Committee for Human Rights, denied the country’s military or state-backed militias use child soldiers. ”We can say today with full confidence that we have a clean slate on child recruitment issues,” he said.

The memo also said “two confirmed cases of child recruitment” by the Myanmar military “were documented during the reporting period.” Human rights advocates have estimated that dozens of children are still conscripted there.

Myanmar government spokesman Zaw Htay challenged accusers to provide details of where and how child soldiers are being used. He noted that in the latest State Department report on human trafficking, “they already recognized (Myanmar) for reducing of child soldiers” – though the report also made clear some children were still conscripted.

The memo said further there was “credible evidence” that a government-supported militia in Afghanistan “recruited and used a child,” meeting the minimum threshold of a single confirmed case that the State Department had previously used as the legal basis for putting a country on the list.

The Afghan defense and interior ministries both denied there were any child soldiers in Afghan national security forces, an assertion that contradicts the State Department’s reports and human rights activists.

A Wide Look at North Korea’s WMD Operations

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Primer:

South Korean surgeons operating on a North Korean defector who escaped across the Demilitarized Zone between the two countries under a hail of gunfire on Nov. 13 have found a parasite in the man’s stomach unlike any other they had seen.

The defector, who was shot five times, remained in critical condition after hours in two rounds of surgery, according to an article in the Korea Biomedical Review published on Nov. 15.

North Korean Cyber Operations: Weapons of Mass Disruption

Over the past 10 years, the escapades of various nation-state actors in the cyber realm have exploded onto the pages of top-tier media, and into prime time network news.

Russian espionage against political targets during the 2016 US presidential election, wide reaching Chinese espionage against Western commercial targets, disruptive attacks against the US financial sector associated with Iran, and the destructive attacks against Sony Pictures Entertainment (SPE) are some of the premier examples of mainstream coverage of ‘cyber.’

Behind every single offensive cyber action conducted in the interest of the capable nation-states is a doctrine,[1] and North Korea, like many other nation-states, has incorporated cyber operations within their own broader military doctrine and has conducted numerous offensive operations in the furtherance of their national agenda. What is particularly alarming about DPRK operations is their willingness to initiate escalatory actions, such as their likely connections to the now infamous WannaCry ransomware, and their targeting of the global financial system.

North Korea’s disregard for the consequences of its actions sets them apart from other nation-states, and is particularly dangerous.

North Korean offensive cyber operations have been conducted to collect sensitive political and military intelligence information, to lash out at enemies who threaten their beliefs and interests, and most interestingly, to generate revenue.

This revenue generation aspect of North Korean operations was thrust into the international spotlight when, in early 2016, unauthorized transfers of funds from the Bangladesh Central Bank were issued using the Society for Worldwide Interbank Financial Telecommunication (SWIFT) network for global banking. The attempted transfers amounting to over $950 million USD sought to move funds to entities in locations such as Sri Lanka and the Philippines; ultimately $81 million USD in funds disappeared into the ether.

The subsequent investigation revealed that the perpetrators of the attack used tools to securely delete records from the SWIFT terminals that would alert Bangladesh Central Bank employees of the transfers. Commonly referred to as a “wiper,” this secure deletion tool contained code that was linked by many in the computer security industry to one used in attacks associated with North Korea, notably the attack on SPE through a US Computer Emergency Response Team (USCERT) alert. The revelation that a state would engage in such a flagrant violation of international norms came as a surprise to many in the information security arena. North Korea watchers were, of course, not surprised as the currency generation activities benefiting the Kim family and their isolated nation have been well understood for some time.

The 2016 SWIFT attacks associated with North Korea are part of the broader currency generation operations of DPRK cyber actors and intelligence organizations. Botnets associated with espionage activity targeting South Korea have been used to generate revenue through a variety of schemes for almost 10 years. Recent DPRK activity suggests an interest in obtaining cryptocurrency, such as bitcoin, through extortion and targeting of cryptocurrency exchanges.

In the third quarter of 2017, for instance, malicious emails containing weaponized documents were used to target international financial organizations, as well as bitcoin exchanges. The ultimate goal of these attacks, which were tracked by the information security community under names such as Stardust Chollima and BlueNoroff, is yet unknown, however theft and sabotage are likely.

Bitcoin provides attractive benefits to the isolated nation due to a lack of regulation and the ability to subvert international sanctions. In May 2017, ‘WannaCry’ exploded across the internet, encrypting sensitive material and holding the keys to decrypt the files for a ransom to be paid in bitcoin. This attack, too, had North Korean fingerprints embedded in the code used to execute the attack, as did the tools that were used to develop that code.

Attribution is a particularly sensitive subject in the cyber domain. Technical artifacts from the executable code that was used to conduct the WannaCry attack overlaps with code used in attacks against South Korean nuclear power plants and the SPE attack of 2014. While the technical artifacts can provide some measurable connections between the attacks, they require deep technical understanding to interpret. Other linkages, such as targeting and operational procedures, are the product of intelligence assessments and have been disputed by various parties muddying the water surrounding the assigning of attribution.

North Korea is an exception to the classical understanding of how most nations implement offensive cyber operations in that they incorporate espionage, disruptive/destructive attacks and financially motivated operations using the same computer code and infrastructure.

The value of cyber operations is likely recognized by North Korea’s most senior leadership through the State Affairs Commission (SAC), the General Staff of the Korean People’s Army, and Kim Jong Un himself. Subordinate units, notably the Reconnaissance General Bureau (RGB), Bureau 121, and the Command Automation Bureau (CAB), are likely responsible for executing the specific operations. The individual units may have a charter to self- finance their operations, or to contribute financial gains back to the regime, but it seems clear that various offensive operations are conducted by differing groups with their own approach and missions. For example, one group may have a primary focus on revenue generation, targeting South Korean banks and SWIFT and conducting extortive attacks, while another group might focus on intelligence collection, while a third conducts sabotage and destructive attacks.

Finally, the maturity of North Korean offensive cyber operations has been demonstrated through the integration of destructive attacks by cyber units during military exercises executed in the midst of escalating tension with South Korea. For instance, following the December 2012 launch of the Kwangmyongsong-3 satellite via the Unha-3 satellite launch vehicle, tensions on the Korean peninsula were high. That March, following the passing of UN Security Council Resolution (UNSCR 2087) and B-52 strategic bomber overflights in South Korea, North Korea responded with a particularly aggressive disruptive attack against South Korea.

This massive wiper attack targeted South Korea’s financial and media sectors and coincided with provocations by North Korean military and escalating political rhetoric. This pairing allowed for maximum psychological impact, while demonstrating North Korea’s ability to integrate offensive cyber activities into well-developed military doctrine. During these attacks, the Korea Broadcasting System (KBS), Munhwa Broadcasting Corporation (MBC), Yonhap Television News (YTN) and several Korean financial institutions reported disruptions. With the threat of military escalation on the table, many in South Korea would have depended on the media outlets for breaking news. Disruption of ATM networks and financial institutions would further add to the chaos as word of media disruptions began to spread.

As tensions are once again escalating between North Korea and the international community, more attacks perpetrated by DPRK cyber actors are likely. The recent increase in financial sector targeting associated with these actors may illustrate the potential for disruptive attacks to demonstrate both the capability of the North Korean actors, as well to achieve objectives in line with their broader military doctrine. While North Korea’s isolation may be detrimental to its economy and international relations, it is an effective shield from which to launch offensive cyber operations against a connected and delicate global system.

  1. [1]

    In order to establish some common definitions, we can look to the United States Department of Defense, who established Computer Network Operations (CNO) as a component of the broader Information Operations (Information Warfare) arena. CNO is further categorized into Computer Network Exploitation (CNE), Computer Network Attack (CNA), and Computer Network Defense (CND). Offensive cyber operations conducted by nation-states using this model would be considered CNE and CNA. The use of CNE can be roughly characterized as espionage, whereas CNA would be used to degrade, deny, disrupt, or destroy the network based systems of an adversary. This model can help provide a clear delineation of how various military, intelligence community, and law enforcement agencies with their authorities are able to conduct operations. China, Russia, Iran and virtually every nation-state in the world conduct CNE/CNA operations in accordance with their legal authorities and national interests.

    ***

    There are other weapons few discuss.

    Pyongyang has already achieved partial coverage of US territories. Last June, in a hearing before the US House Armed Services Committee, the head of the US Missile Defense Agency, Vice Admiral James Syring, said: “The advancement and demonstration of technology of ballistic missiles from North Korea in the last six months have caused great concern to me and others. It is incumbent on us to assume that North Korea today can range the US with an ICBM carrying a nuclear warhead.”

    This particular endeavor was likely assisted by Tehran. A February 2016 report by the Congressional Research Service concluded, “Iran has likely exceeded North Korea’s ability to develop, test, and build ballistic missiles.” Tehran might be, and probably is, helpful to Pyongyang with respect to technological aspects of the nuclear sphere as well.

    The nuclear component within the spectrum of North Korea’s weapons of mass destruction (WMDs) is evidently growing. The big question is whether the country’s despot, Kim Jong-un, will be the first person to use nuclear weapons since 1945.

    Quite recently, Kim elected to employ a highly lethal chemical weapon, the nerve agent VX, for a political assassination. This weapon was used last February by two female operatives, one Indonesian and the other Vietnamese, to murder Kim Jong-un’s estranged half-brother, Kim Jong-nam, in Malaysia. The victim died shortly after being assaulted by the two women, who wiped VX on his face as he prepared to board a flight to the Chinese territory of Macau. Traces of VX were revealed on swabs taken from his eyes and face.

    This deadly chemical agent was probably smuggled from North Korea to Malaysia, which in and of itself was an intriguing and risky move. Six of eight potential suspects were from Pyongyang’s Ministries of State Security and Foreign Affairs. The suspects flew from Kuala Lumpur on the day of the assassination, passing through Vladivostok on their way back to Pyongyang. South Korea’s request to detain four of the suspects was rejected by Russian officials on the grounds of lack of evidence.

    It can be assumed that Kim Jong-un was in on the plot from its inception. Symbolically, at least, this political assassination by VX can be regarded as an indication of Pyongyang’s chemical weapons (CW) capabilities. Whether the regime intended it to or not, the assassination signaled the readiness, usability, and deployability of North Korea’s VX, which can be used for guerrilla warfare, chemical terrorism, or wide-scale chemical attack.

    VX is also weaponized within warheads carried by ballistic missiles in Pyongyang’s  vast CW arsenal. The North Korean ballistic program constitutes the principal, though not the only, vehicle for all three WMD programs. The CW and biological weapons (BW) programs are fully matured and have marked operational offensive capabilities. Inadequate attention is being paid to Pyongyang’s large-scale offensive capacities in terms of CW and BW, but the VX political assassination incident was a wake-up call (if unintentional). More here.