Category Archives: Treasury

FBI Required to Sign Unique NDA on Hillary Case

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If you think the Hillary team, the Department of Justice and the FBI have not colluded with the White House to alter the course of history and the election, then think again.

Proof? Click the link and read it for yourself.  It is all clear now how confident Hillary was, why Comey made his press briefing and why Loretta Lynch refused to answer questions at the hearing. This takes the Department of Justice to the highest level of corruption and collusion in American history. Think about that.

Hillary FBI NDA

‘Gag’ order: FBI confirms special secrecy agreements for agents in Clinton email probe

FNC: The FBI has confirmed to a senior Republican senator that agents were sworn to secrecy — and subject to lie detector tests — in the Hillary Clinton email probe, an extensive measure one former agent said could have a “chilling effect.”

A July 1 letter sent by a senior deputy to FBI Director James Comey to Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Charles Grassley, R-Iowa, detailed the restrictions on agents. The letter, reviewed by Fox News, confirmed agents signed a “Case Briefing Acknowledgement” which says the disclosure of information is “strictly prohibited” without prior approval, and those who sign are subject to lie detector tests.

“The purpose of this form is to maintain an official record of persons knowledgeable of a highly sensitive Federal Bureau of Investigation counterintelligence investigation,” the agreement attached to the Grassley letter reads, “….I (FBI agent) also understand that, due to the nature and sensitivity of this investigation, compliance with these restrictions may be subject to verification by polygraph examination.”

The measures show the extent to which the bureau has gone to keep additional details of the politically sensitive case from going public. While Comey has provided some information ‎on why the FBI did not opt to pursue charges, Attorney General Loretta Lynch repeatedly ducked questions on specifics of the case at a House hearing Tuesday.

A recently retired FBI agent, who declined to speak on the record, citing the sensitivity of the matter, said a “Case Briefing Acknowledgement” is reserved for “the most sensitive of sensitive cases,” and can have a “chilling effect” on agents, who understand “it comes from the very top and that there has to be a tight lid on the case.”

The former agent said the agreements can also contribute to “group think” because investigators cannot bounce ideas off other agents, only those within a small circle.

 

 

 

But John Kerry, Iran Does Support al Qaeda

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Primer:

The State Department confirmed that Iran continues to work with Al-Qaeda elements, despite
their expressed hostility towards one another. It stated: “Iran remained unwilling to bring to
justice senior Al-Qaeda (AQ) members it continued to detain, and refused to publicly identify
those senior members in its custody.
Iran allowed AQ facilitators Muhsin al-Fadhli and Adel Radi Saq al-Wahabi al-Harbi to operate a
core facilitation pipeline through Iran, enabling AQ to move funds and fighters to South Asia and
also to Syria.

Al-Fadhli is a veteran AQ operative who has been active for years. Al-Fadhli began working with the Iran-based AQ facilitation network in 2009 and was later arrested by Iranian authorities. He was released in 2011 and assumed leadership of the Iran-based AQ facilitation network.” Clarion Project

Related reading: Al Qaeda’s Global Reach – State Dept Foreign Terror Org. List

Related reading: Usama bin Ladin’s sons thought to be in Iran

Related reading: Osama bin Laden’s Son Threatens Revenge Against U.S. For Father’s Assassination

Top Intel Official: Al Qaeda Worked on WMD in Iran

New evidence of the bin Laden-Iran connection.

WeeklyStandard: Al Qaeda operatives based in Iran worked on  and biological weapons, according to a letter written to Osama bin Laden that is described in a new book by a top former U.S. intelligence official.

The letter was captured by a U.S. military sensitive site exploitation team during the raid on bin Laden’s Abbottabad headquarters in May 2011. It is described in Field of Fight, out Tuesday from Lieutenant General Michael Flynn, the former head of the Defense Intelligence Agency, and Michael Ledeen of the Foundation for Defense of Democracies.

“One letter to bin Laden reveals that al Qaeda was working on chemical and biological weapons in Iran,” Flynn writes.

Flynn’s claim, if true, significantly advances what we know about al Qaeda’s activity in Iran. The book was cleared by the intelligence community’s classification review process. And U.S. intelligence sources familiar with the bin Laden documents tell us the disclosure on al Qaeda’s WMD work is accurate.

Flynn notes that only a small subset of bin Laden’s files have been released to the public. The “Defense Intelligence Agency’s numerous summaries and analyses of the files remain classified,” too, Flynn writes. “But even the public peek gives us considerable insight into the capabilities of this very dangerous global organization.”

It’s not just al Qaeda.

  

“There’s a lot of information on Iran in the files and computer discs captured at the Pakistan hideout of Osama bin Laden,” Flynn writes in the introduction. The authors note that the relationship between Iran and al Qaeda “has always been strained” and “[s]ometimes bin Laden himself would erupt angrily at the Iranians.” Previously released documents and other evidence show that al Qaeda kidnapped an Iranian diplomat in order to force a hostage exchange and bin Laden was very concerned about the Iranians’ ability to track his family members.

And yet the book makes clear that Flynn believes there is much more to the al Qaeda-Iran relationship than the public has been told. And that’s not an accident. Obama administration “censors have been busy,” Flynn writes, blocking the release of the bin Laden documents to the public and, in some cases, to analysts inside the U.S. intelligence community. “Some of it—a tiny fraction—has been declassified and released, but the bulk of it is still under official seal. Those of us who have read bin Laden’s material know how important it is…”

Not surprisingly, Obama administration officials bristle at Flynn’s characterization of their lack of transparency and lack of urgency on jihadists and their state sponsors. “Mike Flynn, in true Kremlin form, has been peddling these baseless conspiracy theories for years. Anyone who thinks Iran was or is in bed with al Qaeda doesn’t know much about either,” an Obama administration official told THE WEEKLY STANDARD.

It’s an odd line of attack, given the fact that the Obama administration has repeatedly accused Iran of directly aiding al Qaeda. The Treasury and State Departments publicly accused the Iranian regime of allowing al Qaeda to operate inside Iran in: July 2011, December 2011, February 2012,July 2012, October 2012, May 2013, January 2014, February 2014, April 2014, and August 2014. In addition, in congressional testimony in February 2012, Director of National Intelligence James Clapper described the relationship as a “marriage of convenience.”

Asked about the administration’s own repeated statements pointing to the Iranian regime’s deal with al Qaeda, the administration official who dismissed Flynn’s claim as a “baseless conspiracy” theory declined to comment further.

The Flynn/Ledeen claim about al Qaeda’s WMD work in Iran comes with an interesting wrinkle. The authors preface their disclosure of al Qaeda’s work on “chemical and biological weapons in Iran” by suggesting that the revelation was included in documents already public.

But the only document released to date that seems to touch on the subject is a March 28, 2007, letter to an al Qaeda operative known as “Hafiz Sultan.” The letter, which discussed the possibility of Iran-based al Qaeda operatives using chlorine gas on Kurdish leaders and includes a likely reference to Atiyah ‘Abd-al-Rahman, was released by the administration via the Combating Terrorism Center at West Point in May 2012. President Obama’s Treasury Department has claimed that Rahman was appointed by Osama bin Laden “to serve as al Qaeda’s emissary in Iran, a position which allowed him to travel in and out of Iran with the permission of Iranian officials.” It is not, however, addressed to bin Laden and it does not include a reference to biological weapons.

And while the U.S. Treasury and State Department have repeatedly sanctioned al Qaeda’s operatives inside Iran and offered rewards for information on their activities, as noted, statements from Treasury and the State Department do not mention al Qaeda’s “chemical and biological weapons” work inside Iran.

The takeaway: It does not appear that the al Qaeda document referenced by Flynn has been released by the U.S. government.

Flynn and others who have seen the documents say there are more explosive revelations in the bin Laden files kept from the public. Those already released give us a hint. One document, released in 2015, is a letter presumably written by Osama bin Laden to the “Honorable brother Karim.” The recipient of the October 18, 2007, missive, “Karim,” was likely an al Qaeda veteran known Abu Ayyub al Masri, who led al Qaeda in the Iraq (AQI) at the time.

Bin Laden chastised the AQI leader for threatening to attack Iran. The al Qaeda master offered a number of reasons why this didn’t make sense. “You did not consult with us on that serious issue that affects the general welfare of all of us,” bin Laden wrote. “We expected you would consult with us for these important matters, for as you are aware, Iran is our main artery for funds, personnel, and communication, as well as the matter of hostages.”

That language from bin Laden sounds a lot like the language the Obama administration used in July 2011, when a statement from the U.S. Treasury noted that the network in Iran “serves as the core pipeline through which Al Qaeda moves money, facilitators and operatives from across the Middle East to South Asia.”

David Cohen, who was then a top Treasury official and is now the number two official at the CIA, told us back then: “There is an agreement between the Iranian government and al Qaeda to allow this network to operate. There’s no dispute in the intelligence community on this.”

Why, then, is the Obama administration attempting to dismiss the cooperative relationship between Iran and al Qaeda as a “baseless conspiracy?” Good question.

And it’s one that releasing the rest of the documents could help answer.

Note: Flynn’s co-author Michael Ledeen is a colleague of Thomas Joscelyn at the Foundation for Defense of Democracies.

****

Most recently, in September, the Obama administration launched missile strikes against al Qaeda’s so-called Khorasan Group in Syria. The administration pointed to  indicating that this cadre of “core” al Qaeda operatives was planning mass killings in the West, and possibly even in the United States. Two of the terrorists who lead the Khorasan Group formerly headed al Qaeda’s operations in Iran. Tellingly, Iran allowed this pair to continue their fight against the West, even as they have battled Iran’s chief allies in Syria.

Obama’s Treasury Department first publicly recognized the relationship between the Iranian regime and al Qaeda on July 28, 2011. Treasury added six al Qaeda operatives to the U.S. government’s list of designated terrorists. The principal terrorist among them is known as Yasin al-Suri, “a prominent Iran-based al Qaeda facilitator” who operates “under an agreement between al Qaeda and the Iranian government.” Treasury described al Qaeda’s presence in Iran as a “core pipeline” and “a critical transit point for funding to support al Qaeda’s activities in Afghanistan and Pakistan.” Treasury made it clear that other high-level al Qaeda members were actively involved in shuttling cash and recruits across Iran.

John Kerry, Iran is Cheating on JPOA, Germany Report

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Paging Mr. Kerry, paging Mr. Obama, paging Ben Rhodes..paging anyone, pick up on line 4.

Do we have to rely on Angela Merkel of Germany to get the truth?

In 2015: The number two man at the CIA said today he has a “high degree of confidence” that if Iran cheats on the newly-signed, controversial nuclear deal, the U.S. intelligence community would catch them in the act.

“Our assessment of the provisions that are in the JCPOA (Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action) that provide the real-time, persistent access to the cleared sites, as well as a mechanism for getting scheduled access to suspicious sites, combined with other capabilities and information that we have available to us, gives us a reasonably high degree of confidence that we would be able to detect Iran if it were trying to deviate from the requirements that they’ve signed up to in the JCPOA,” David Cohen, Deputy Director of the Central Intelligence Agency said at the Aspen Security Forum today. “So I think our assessment is that the JCPOA gives us a good ability to detect Iranian deviation from the limitations on enrichment and the other specific elements in the JCPOA.”

When referring to access to Iranian sites, Cohen was presumably referring to the access provided to International Atomic Energy Agency inspectors, as stipulated in the agreement, not access by the CIA. More here from ABC.

***** So….under Obama and Kerry, is the CIA allowed to track Iranian actions and report cheating and violations?

*****

Iran cheats on nuclear deal

Elliott Abrams is a senior fellow for Middle East Studies at the Council on Foreign Relations. This piece is reprinted with permission and can be found on Abrams’ blog “Pressure Points.”

Hayom: The greatest imminent danger in last year’s nuclear deal, the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action, was always that Iran would cheat — taking all the advantages of the deal, but then seeking to move forward more quickly toward a nuclear weapon — and that the Obama administration would be silent in the face of that cheating.

This was always a reasonable prospect, given the history of arms control agreements. Those who negotiate such agreements wish to defend them. They do not wish to say, six or 12 months and even years later, that they were duped and that the deals must be considered null and void.

Last week, Germany’s intelligence agency produced a report detailing Iranian cheating. Here is an excerpt from the news story:

“Germany’s domestic intelligence agency said in its annual report that Iran has a ‘clandestine’ effort to seek illicit nuclear technology and equipment from German companies ‘at what is, even by international standards, a quantitatively high level.’ The findings by the Federal Office for the Protection of the Constitution, Germany’s equivalent of the FBI, were issued in a 317-page report last week.

“German Chancellor Angela Merkel underscored the findings in a statement to parliament, saying Iran violated the United Nations Security Council’s anti-missile development regulations. ‘Iran continued unabated to develop its rocket program in conflict with the relevant provisions of the U.N. Security Council,’ Merkel told the Bundestag. … The German report also stated, ‘It is safe to expect that Iran will continue its intensive procurement activities in Germany using clandestine methods to achieve its objectives.’

“According to an Institute for Science and International Security July 7 report by David Albright and Andrea Stricker, Iran is required to get permission from a UN Security Council panel for ‘purchases of nuclear direct-use goods.’

“While the German intelligence report did not say what specifically Iran had obtained or attempted to obtain, the more recent report said dual use goods such as carbon fiber must be reported. Iran did not seek permission from the U.N.-affiliated panel for its proliferation attempts and purchases in Germany, officials said.”

Here is a summary of that report by the Institute for Science and International Security:

“The Institute for Science and International Security has learned that Iran’s Atomic Energy Organization recently made an attempt to purchase tons of controlled carbon fiber from a country. This attempt occurred after Implementation Day of the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action. The attempt to acquire carbon fiber was denied by the supplier and its government. Nonetheless, the AEOI had enough carbon fiber to replace existing advanced centrifuge rotors and had no need for additional quantities over the next several years, let alone for tons of carbon fiber. This attempt thus raises concerns over whether Iran intends to abide by its JCPOA commitments. In particular, Iran may seek to stockpile the carbon fiber so as to be able to build advanced centrifuge rotors far beyond its current needs under the JCPOA, providing an advantage that would allow it to quickly build an advanced centrifuge enrichment plant if it chose to leave or disregard the JCPOA during the next few years. The carbon fiber procurement attempt is also another example of efforts by the P5+1 to keep secret problematic Iranian actions.”

So Iran isn’t only being more aggressive since the signing of the JCPOA — in Iraq and Syria, for example, or in cyber attacks on the United States — but is also cheating on the deal. And what is the reaction from the Obama administration, and other cheerleaders for the JCPOA? Nothing.

John Kerry famously said, “Iran deserves the benefits of the agreement they struck.” They do not deserve to be allowed to cheat. Kerry said in April when asked if Iran would “stick to the key terms of this deal for the next 20 years” that “I have faith and confidence that we will know exactly what they’re doing during that period of time. And if they decide to try to cheat, we will know it, and there are plenty of options available to us. That I have complete faith and confidence in.”

That’s nice. But now we know they are cheating, and the option the administration appears to have chosen is silence: just ignore the problem. When asked about the German intel report and the Institute for Science and International Security report, the State Department spokesman replied, “We have absolutely no indication that Iran has procured any materials in violation of the JCPOA.”

Needless to say this kind of response will only encourage Iran to cheat more, secure in the knowledge that Obama administration officials will not call them out on it, nor choose any serious one of the “plenty of options” it says it has. This means that Iran’s breakout time will diminish, and the danger to its neighbors and to the United States will grow and grow.

From “Pressure Points” by Elliott Abrams. Reprinted with permission from the Council on Foreign Relations.

Yikes, FBI Director Comey’s Connections

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In 1996, Comey acted as deputy special counsel to the Senate Whitewater Committee.

 

HSBC Holdings Plc. and HSBC Bank USA N.A. Admit to Anti-Money Laundering and Sanctions Violations, Forfeit $1.256 Billion in Deferred Prosecution Agreement
Bank Agrees to Enhanced Compliance Obligations, Oversight by Monitorin Connection with Five-year Agreement

Comey was appointed to the board of directors of the London-based financial institution HSBC Holdings, to improve the company’s compliance program after its $1.9 billion settlement with the Justice Department for failing to comply with basic due diligence requirements for money laundering regarding Mexican drug cartels and terrorism financing. Banks too big to fail? Summary is here from Bloomberg.

James Brien Comey, Jr. (52), former United States Deputy Attorney General, has been appointed a Director of HSBC Holdings plc with effect from 4 March 2013. He will be an independent non-executive Director and a member of the Financial System Vulnerabilities Committee.

CPC Green Initiative

… million has been committed to NELP from CPC, Deutsche Bank, HSBC, Goldman Sachs, and Morgan Stanley. In 2009, Deutsche … City of New York Pratt Institute HSBC Holdings Amalgamated Bank …

Scaling Rainwater Harvesting for 21st Century Mexico

… to install rainwater harvesting systems. With funding from HSBC, Isla Urbana is developing and testing different implementation strategies … Without Borders Temo Foundation HSBC Philanthropic Programs …

Building the Corporate Coalition

… and government leaders that includes the leaders of BP and HSBC (the world’s second largest bank). Its core coalition quickly grew to … BSkyB, British Telecom, Catalyst, Cheyne Capital Management, HSBC Holdings Plc, Interface, Johnson & Johnson, Munich Re Group, Starbucks, …

Report: Holder Blocked HSBC Trial On Drug Cartel Money Laundering Scandal

Clinton foundation received up to $81m from clients of controversial HSBC bank

  • Leaked files reveal identities of wealthy donors with accounts in Geneva
  • Donors gave as much as $81m to Bill, Hillary and Chelsea Clinton Foundation
  • Hillary Clinton expected to make inequality a key issue of any 2016 campaign

The charitable foundation run by Hillary Clinton and her family has received as much as $81m from wealthy international donors who were clients of HSBC’s controversial Swiss bank.

Leaked files from HSBC’s Swiss banking division reveal the identities of seven donors to the Bill, Hillary and Chelsea Clinton Foundation with accounts in Geneva.

They include Frank Giustra, a Canadian mining magnate and one of the foundation’s biggest financial backers, and Richard Caring, the British retail magnate who, the bank’s internal records show, used his tax-free Geneva account to transfer $1m into the New York-based foundation.

Hillary Clinton has expressed concern over growing economic inequality in the US and is expected to make the issue a cornerstone of her widely anticipated presidential campaign in 2016. However, political observers are increasingly asking whether the former secretary of state’s focus on wealth inequality sits uncomfortably with the close relationships she and her husband have nurtured with some of the world’s richest individuals.

Giustra’s Swiss HSBC account, created in 2002, contained up to $10m in the 2006-2007 period. Lawyers for the mining magnate said that he held the account for investment purposes, and that it was in compliance with Canadian laws that required disclosure of foreign assets. More from Guardian

U.S. Ambassador says he’s sorry but Poles want apology from FBI chief over offensive Holocaust remarks, DailyMail

  • FBI director James Comey suggested in remarks last week that Poles were accomplices during the holocaust
  • Comey’s comments are offensive to Poles as they had no role in running death camps and were themselves victims of the Third Reich
  • Poles see themselves as heroes of the war who have never been properly recognized, making the comments yet more hurtful
  • The remarks came shortly before the 72nd anniversary of the Warsaw Ghetto Uprising, which was commemorated on Sunday 
  • The U.S. ambassador to Poland, Stephen Mull, was called to the Foreign Ministry in a formal act of protest
  • The incident echoes a gaffe by President Obama in 2012 when he referred to ‘a Polish death camp’ – he offered his regrets for the error 

State Dept Purged the Emails, Anti Israel

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State Department Purged Emails About Secret Anti-Netanyahu Campaign

Key emails deleted despite requirement to archive

FreeBeacon: A State Department official deleted emails that included information about a secret campaign to oust Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu during the country’s last election, according to a Senate investigatory committee that determined the Obama administration transferred tax funds to anti-Netanyahu groups.

The Senate Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations disclosed in a massive report on Tuesday that the Obama administration provided U.S. taxpayer dollars to the OneVoice Movement, a liberal group that waged a clandestine campaign to smear and oust Netanyahu from office.

OneVoice, which was awarded $465,000 in U.S. grants through 2014, has been under congressional investigation since 2015, when it was first accused of funneling money to partisan political groups looking to unseat Netanyahu. This type of behavior by non-profit groups is prohibited under U.S. tax law.

The investigation determined that OneVoice redirected State Department funds to anti-Netanyahu efforts and that U.S. officials subsequently erased emails containing information about the administration’s relationship with the non-profit group.

Related reading: March 2015/ Netanyahu Prevailed Against EU/USA Anti-Semitism

The disclosure comes amid a massive effort by Congress to reform the State Department’s email practices in light of former Secretary of State and Democratic presidential frontrunner’s Hillary Clinton’s mishandling of classified materials.

The Washington Free Beacon revealed early Tuesday that new legislation would ban all State Department officials from using private email accounts and servers, as well as mandate annual reports about the leak of classified information.

A senior State Department official admitted to congressional investigators that he deleted several emails pertaining to the administration’s coordination with OneVoice.

“The State Department was unable to produce all documents responsive to the Subcommittee’s requests due to its failure to retain complete email records of Michael Ratney, who served as U.S. Consul General in Jerusalem during the award and oversight of the OneVoice grants,” the report states.

Related reading: Jeremy Bird in Violation of the Logan Act?

Investigators “discovered this retention problem because one important email exchange between OneVoice and Mr. Ratney … was produced to the Subcommittee only by OneVoice,” the report continues. “After conducting additional searches, the Department informed the Subcommittee that it was unable to locate any responsive emails from Mr. Ratney’s inbox or sent mail.”

Ratney was ultimately forced to tell investigators that “[a]t times I deleted emails with attachments I didn’t need in order to maintain my inbox under the storage limit.”

While Ratney had the option to archive emails—as required by the department—he did not do this. Ratney claimed he was not aware of the rule, stating he “did not know [he] was required to archive routine emails.”

The deletion of the email chains appears to be a violation of the Federal Records Act, which mandates official records be archived for future disclosure purposes.

One source with intimate knowledge of the situation told the Free Beacon that the deletion of these emails is highly suspicious given the seriousness of the claims about the administration’s behavior.

Related reading: Obama’s War on Israel

“The Obama administration had the money, skills, and personnel to build a gigantic campaign infrastructure that was used to try to defeat the prime minister of an ally,” the source said. “But apparently they didn’t have what they needed to store the emails in which they did all of those things. That’s certainly a lucky break for the State Department.”

State Department officials did not immediately respond to a request for further information about the investigation and the deletion of emails.

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Sens. Rob Portman (R-Ohio) and Claire McCaskill (D-Mo.) each signed off on the investigation, which was conducted by Portman’s Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations. In releasing the report, Portman criticized the State Department for lax oversight and for undermining a U.S. ally.

“The State Department ignored warning signs and funded a politically active group in a politically sensitive environment with inadequate safeguards,” Portman said. “It is completely unacceptable that U.S. taxpayer dollars were used to build a political campaign infrastructure that was deployed — immediately after the grant ended — against the leader of our closest ally in the Middle East.”

The investigation is notable for its bipartisan sheen. McCaskill highlighted the conclusion that it showed “no wrongdoing” by President Barack Obama’s administration but said the report “certainly highlights deficiencies in the Department’s policies that should be addressed in order to best protect taxpayer dollars.” Read more from Politico