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Paul Manafort, who served as President Trumps campaign chairman during the summer of 2016, is wanted for questioning in a Ukrainian corruption case, CNN reported.

Ukraine first sent requests to question Manafort to U.S. authorities in December of 2014 in case related to Oleksandr Lavrynovych, a former Ukrainian justice minister.

U.S. officials confirmed the requests to CNN but refused to provide further comment to the network.

"We believe they wanted to avoid the time-consuming competition they would have had to organize to hire the law firm legally, so they drew up the undervalued contract and probably arranged to pay the real fee in cash," Serhiy Gorbatyuk, the prosecutor for special investigations in Ukraine, told CNN.

According to documents reviewed by the news network and provided by Ukrainian officials, prosecutors told U.S. officials that the probe"established that the well-known American political strategist Paul Manafort is implicated in the relationship."

One letter sent to the U.S. Department of Justice said Manafort "was likely the person who advised representatives of the former Government of Ukraine to hire the law firm and was present during talks about this issue."

Manafort, who the story notes is not being charged, refused to comment for CNNs story.

Manafort resigned from the Trump campaign in August of 2016 following reports that he was paid millions of dollars for work for the Russia-supported former president of Ukraine, Viktor Yanukovych.

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Manafort wanted for questioning in Ukraine: report | TheHill - The Hill

20.03.17 (UKRAINE) - Fedcominvest will strongly contest the politically motivated freezing of the Ukrainian assets of the company`s Chairman, Alekszej Fedoricsev. The company is confident that the arbitrary nature of the State of Ukraine`s actions will be uncovered in the appropriate courts.

Fedcominvest would like to make it clear that any accusations of wrongdoing against its Chairman by the controversial and discredited National Anti-Corruption Bureau of Ukraine (NABU) are strenuously denied and are part of an ill-informed and politically motivated attack.

This attempt by the State of Ukraine to seize Mr Fedoricsev`s assets has its origins in a series of contracts entered into by the State Food and Grain Corporation of Ukraine, PJSC (SF&G) to export grain from Ukraine to China.

In 2012, SF&G entered into a US$ 3 billion `loan-for-grains` contract, which the Ukrainian Government agreed with the Chinese government, knowing that the maximum transhipment capacity of their own terminals was just 2.4 million tonnes per year. From more or less the commencement of the loan term, China demanded more grain from Ukraine than could be transhipped through State terminals. In 2013, demand reached such a level that the SF&G was unable to perform its obligations to China.

The SF&G therefore sought use of Ukraine`s privately owned terminals to tranship grain. They approached the owner of TIS terminals Mr Fedoricsev, as TIS terminals are the largest deep-water terminals in Ukraine, with transhipment capacities of 27 million tonnes per year.

Unaccustomed to using private terminals and abiding by accepted market practices, SF&G entered into a commercial dispute over a deal made in Mr Fedoricsev`s TIS terminals with a separate company (Lirtavis). It is important to note that Mr Fedoricsev has no commercial or other interest in Lirtavis. Despite having no legal interest in the dispute between SF&G and Lirtavis, the Ukrainian anti-corruption authorities have now seized the assets of Mr Fedoricsev as part of a wide-ranging and arbitrary criminal investigation flowing from the dispute.

The ultimate objective of the Ukrainian state`s investigations appear to be to appropriate the privately owned TIS terminals in order to service the SF&G`s growing need for transhipment capacity and meet the current high demand for grain exports. Only last year, SF&G`s Deputy Chairman, Andriy Repko admitted that the Ukrainian Government needed to build a new grain terminal suitable for large vessels in order to meet the demand of grain shipments to China. Their desperation is only exacerbated by the fact that the Chinese Import-Export bank has already brought arbitration proceedings against Ukraine for defaulting on the loan.

Spotting an opportunity to appropriate Mr Fedoricsev`s property, the Ukrainian authorities expanded their criminal investigation against SF&G into arbitrary and unlawful criminal investigation into Mr Fedoricsev`s companies. They have unjustly pursued key figures at Mr Fedoricsev`s TIS terminals and Mr Fedoricsev himself. This has now culminated in the unreasonable freezing of Mr Fedorisev`s Ukrainian assets.

Fedcominvest is completely confident that these illogical state actions will be overturned in the appropriate courts. Mr Alekszej Fedoricsev will of course help the authorities in any way he can.

Mr Fedoricsev says,

"I am disappointed by the lack of due process and malicious lies that have been spread about me and my businesses in Ukraine. It is unfathomable to think that I am being punished by the authorities for giving them the opportunity to meet their obligations under a loan which is hugely important to the Ukrainian state. It is clear to me that those who invest in Ukraine`s infrastructure, create employment and improve its economy are rewarded by the State with nothing but contempt. These arbitrary actions are indicative of a desperate State which is willing to go to any length to protect itself, with no regard for its people or economy."

Marco Garzone, Vice President of Fedcominvest, says, "We are confident that these malicious and cruel actions taken by the Ukrainian Anti-Corruption Bureau will be proven to be groundless by the appropriate courts. This absolutely baseless attack by the NABU on our Chairman, who is a well-respected international businessman, will not be accepted by Fedcominvest. We will support him completely throughout this ordeal."

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**ENDS**

Background information:

1. Fedcominvest Europe SARL

Fedcominvest Europe SARL, is a world-leading export business, specialising in the trading of grain, sulphur and fertilizers.

Founded in 2009 in the Principality of Monaco, the company has expertise in the storage, shipping and distribution of a variety of commodities. Fedcominvest has a significant presence in Western Europe and is a market-leader in the supply of grain from the deep-water ports of Odessa region to countries in the MENA region.

In 2016 Fedcominvest shipped over 5 million tonnes of grain to countries around the world including, Bangladesh, Malaysia, Saudi Arabia and Vietnam.

2. Alekszej Fedoricsev

Alekszej Fedoricsev is a successful Russian-born businessman. He is the founder of Fedcominvest, a global export business, specialising in the trading of sulphur and fertilizers.

After starting his career as a professional footballer for Moscow club FC Dynamo, Mr Fedoricsev began trading in car parts during the fall of the Soviet Union. He quickly became a specialist in the business of logistics, concentrating on transporting and trading in grain and chemicals including ammonia, phosphates and sulphur. His company, Fedcominvest, is now a global leader in the field.

A values-driven and self-made businessman, Mr Fedoricsev`s business ethos is centred on re-investing profits back into his businesses. This has proven to be a hugely successful model, with his business interests now spanning across commodities, sport, media, shipping and property.

A passionate sportsperson, Mr Fedoricsev is a leading figure in European football. Fedcominvest is a sponsor of Monaco FC and Mr Fedoricsev previously owned a significant stake in FC Dynamo (Moscow). As part of his commitment to make football accessible to all, he bought the rights to show football in Russia and allowed fans to watch the matches for no charge.

3. 2012 Loan-For-Grains Contract between the Governments of China and Ukraine

In 2012, the Ukrainian Government entered into a Loan-For-Grains Contract with the China National Complete Engineering Corporation ("CCEC") under which the Chinese Government agreed to provide Ukraine with access to $3 billion in credit lines in exchange for supplies of corn. It was reported that the Export-Import Bank of China ("Eximbank") agreed to lend this money at six-month LIBOR+4.5% over 15 years with a five-year grace period.

The first $1.5-billion tranche of a loan was sent by China`s Eximbank to the State Food and Grain Corporation of Ukraine in 2013.

At the time this agreement was reached the Ukrainian Farm Minister Mykola Prysyazhnyuk was quoted as stating that Ukraine expected to supply between 2.0 million to 2.5 million tonnes of maize to China every year to pay off the $3 billion loan.

See: https://www.ft.com/content/79bc2174-0276-11e2-8cf8-00144feabdc0 http://china.aiddata.org/projects/42559

4. The dispute between SF&G and Lirtavis

In 2012, SF&G entered into a US$ 3 billion `loan-for-grains` contract, which the Ukrainian Government agreed with the Chinese government, knowing that the maximum transhipment capacity of their own terminals was just around 2 million tonnes per year.

From more or less the commencement of the loan term, China demanded more grain from Ukraine that could be transhipped through State terminals. In 2013, this demand reached such a level that the SF&G was unable to perform its obligations under the loan. SF&G therefore sought use of Ukraine`s privately owned TIS terminals to tranship their grain.

In order to secure the transhipment services at privately owned terminals in Odesa region SF&G had to do two things they were unaccustomed to doing:

Due to Ukrainian currency restrictions on foreign companies, SF&G were unable to pay for transhipment directly to the foreign company (which was Mr Fedoricsev`s logistics company Grain-Trans, which provides informational and commercial support of the transhipment process) and agreed with TIS terminals` owner, Mr Fedoricsev, that they would pay the part of transhipment costs to the foreign company once the restrictions are lifted.

To facilitate the deal, SF&G secured their obligation to pay for transhipment with the grain to a third company (Lirtavis), which would prepay the transhipment costs to Grain-Trans. It is important to note that Mr Fedoricsev has no commercial or other interest in Lirtavis. He is, however, the owner of the terminals which SF&G desperately required to meet demand for grain exports.

To this day, SF&G has not paid the balance of transhipment costs to Grain-Trans, so Lirtavis has lawfully withheld part-payment of the grain to cover this expense.

5. National Anti-Corruption Bureau of Ukraine (NABU)

The National Anti-Corruption Bureau of Ukraine (NABU) is a Ukrainian law enforcement agency founded in October 2014 which investigates corruption in Ukraine and prepares cases for prosecution. NABU has investigatory powers although it cannot indict suspects directly and must pass any evidence of corruption over to the Prosecutor General of Ukraine.

NABU was created at the request of the International Monetary Fund and the European Commission in return for the relaxation of visa restrictions between Ukraine and the European Union. NABU`s funding by the Ukrainian Government is mandated under US and European Union aid programs.

NABU recently received funding from the UK Department for International Development (DFID) as part of the Good Governance Fund for Eastern Europe and the Western Balkans.

The NABU`s first 70 detectives only started work on 1 October 2015 and NABU has already been the subject of allegations of corruption and ineffectiveness.

The Ukrainian Prosecutor General`s office has strongly criticised the bureau`s impartiality and President Poroshenko is currently trying to appoint his choice to be the independent auditor to NABU, despite the Ukrainian Parliament`s backing a different candidate.

In February 2017, the Head of the EU Delegation to Ukraine Hugues Mingarelli expressed concern about proposed amendments to the laws governing NABU and noted the EU Delegation was `alarmed` at the state of anti-corruption efforts in Ukraine.

Contact: media@fedcominvestmonaco.com

This announcement is distributed by NASDAQ OMX Corporate Solutions on behalf of NASDAQ OMX Corporate Solutions clients.

The issuer of this announcement warrants that they are solely responsible for the content, accuracy and originality of the information contained therein. Source: Fedcominvest Monaco SAM via GlobeNewswire HUG#2089147

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Fedcominvest denounces Ukraine's politically motivated attack on its Chairman, Alekszej Fedoricsev - Yahoo Finance

We checked a statement by House Intelligence Chairman Devin Nunes, R-Calif.

In his opening statement at a closely watched hearing about possible Russian interference with the 2016 presidential election, House Intelligence Chairman Devin Nunes, R-Calif., criticized United States policy toward Russia under President Barack Obama.

"In recent years, committee members have issued repeated and forceful pleas for stronger actions against Russian belligerence, but the Obama administration was committed to the notion, against all evidence, that we could reset relations with Putin," Nunes said.

This description of the Obama administrations position struck us as one-sided, so we took a closer look. We asked Nunes's office for comment, but didn't hear back.

We concludedits misleading for Nunes to have ignored at least three years of the Obama administration in which the reset policy was dead, replaced by a much tougher line on Moscow.

How the reset came about

In March 2009, about two months after Obama was sworn in, his administration initiated a new policy toward Russia called the "reset." The official kickoff came in Geneva on March 6, 2009, when then-Secretary of State Hillary Clinton gave her Russian counterpart Sergei Lavrov a red button.

The new policy came less than a year after conflict flared in South Ossetia and Abkhazia, two regions of Georgia, an independent country that was previously part of the Soviet Union. Obamas foreign policy team had decided that the United States had a window of opportunity to find common ground on certain issues with Russia, given that Dmitry Medvedev had replaced Vladimir Putin as president in mid 2008.

The administration -- and some outside observers -- credit the reset with some achievements, at least initially.

During the period when the reset was U.S. policy, the two nations signed a nuclear-arms treaty; reached an agreement to allow U.S. troops and weapons destined for Afghanistan to be sent through Russian territory rather than Pakistan; collaborated on tough United Nations sanctions against Iran; achieved Russian membership in the World Trade Organization; and agreed that Russia would not use a U.N. Security Council veto to block a bombing campaign in Libya by the United States and its European allies.

As time went on, though, the reset drew increasing criticism. In 2011, former chess champion and human-rights activist Garry Kasparov criticized both Obama and Putin, telling the Daily Beast that the reset was "a disaster." And Douglas J. Feith, who served as undersecretary of defense for policy during the George W. Bush administration, co-wrote an article in Foreign Policy that called the reset "a head-shaking disappointment."

The reset peters out

The era of cooperation began to come apart in 2012 -- not coincidentally, the year Putin returned to the presidency after Medvedevs term.

Large street protests in his 2012 presidential campaign "had unnerved Mr. Putin, and he accused Mrs. Clinton of instigating them," the New York Times reported. "White House officials had hoped the hostile talk was just for domestic campaign purposes, but even after Mr. Putin formally won re-election, he kept it up."

Relations worsened further in 2013, when Russia took in Edward Snowden, a former National Security Agency contractor who had leaked a large trove of sensitive intelligence.

The last straw, however, came in 2014 with Russias intervention in Ukraine. A popular revolution overthrew pro-Russian President Viktor Yanukovych of Ukraine, another former Soviet republic that became independent after the end of the Cold War. Russia responded by applying military pressure in pro-Russian regions of Ukraine and eventually annexing Crimea.

In addition to strongly condemning Russias actions, the United States worked with its European allies to impose a series of escalating sanctions on Moscow starting on March 6, 2014.

The sanctions "inflicted real costs on Russia," said Dan Nexon, a Georgetown University foreign service professor.

Emma Ashford, a research fellow with expertise on Russia at the libertarian Cato Institute, said that while the reset was "dying" between 2012 and 2014, the sanctions were a turning point.

"By 2014, with turmoil in Ukraine and the Russian invasion of Crimea, there was no longer any real attempt to seek the reset," she said. "In fact, the Obama administration pursued a strong sanctions policy against Russia, and contributed troops to bolster NATO forces in Eastern Europe."

Other experts agreed.

"Certainly by March 2014, when Russia annexed Crimea, there was no evidence of any ongoing Obama administration commitment to the reset," added Susan H. Allen, a foreign policy specialist at George Mason University. "The U.S. condemnation of the annexation of Crimea was clear and unequivocal."

"By 2014, I don't know how anyone could credibly argue that U.S. policy was the reset policy," added Richard Nephew, a research scholar at Columbia University.

Our ruling

Nunes said, "In recent years ... the Obama administration was committed to the notion, against all evidence, that we could reset relations with Putin."

Nunes summary of U.S. policy toward Russia is at best incomplete. The Obama administration did pursue a reset policy, and kept it up arguably as late as 2014. But observers agree that the policy was dead no later than early 2014, when Russia intervened in Ukraine, and was already in question for two years before that.

Nunes statement is misleadingly oversimplified, so we rate it Half True.

Originally posted here:
Devin Nunes oversimplifies timeline of Obama 'reset' with Russia - PolitiFact

New York Times

Opposition and a Shave: Former Obama Aides Counter Trump New York Times They were co-authors of Mr. Obama's 2011 speech at the White House Correspondents Association dinner that lampooned Mr. Trump so harshly that it helped form his decision to make a real presidential bid, I'll-show-'em style. (The speech depicted him as ...

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Opposition and a Shave: Former Obama Aides Counter Trump - New York Times

Alyssa Mastromonaco, a former White House aide to President Obama, criticized President Trumps repeated allegations that Mr. Obama had ordered a wiretap surveillance of Trump Tower.

Former White House deputy chief of staff of operations Alyssa Mastromonaco.

CBS News

On CBS This Morning Monday, co-anchor Charlie Rose asked how angry President Obama was about Mr. Trumps allegations of wiretapping.

I dont know how angry he is, Mastromonaco said. I know the rest of us were pretty pissed.

Because? Because its insane. Because its an insane accusation. And its an insane accusation for a president to accuse another president of, and also for anyone who knows Barack Obama. He wouldnt do that.

She also described the turmoil of the Trump administrations first two months in office as pretty uncommon. The first 100 days, youre always trying to get your bearings, and it seems that anything that existed before them, theyre just shooting down for sport, whether its protocol or bills.

Mastromonaco, who served as deputy chief of staff of operations for Obama -- the youngest woman ever to do so -- acknowledged that she preferred a behind the scenes role, rather than to appear on camera.

I had never been a person who was out there, she said, recalling her interview years earlier with Charlie Rose. I didnt think that my job was to be on camera. It was to be running things. And there are people who should be out there and people running things, and I decided just to stay behind the scenes.

Twelve

Her new book is called Who Thought This Was a Good Idea? And Other Questions You Should Have Answers to When You Work in the White House (Twelve).

Co-anchor Gayle King asked, You talk about being a woman in the old boys club and how at times it was intimidating, but other times you said, Oh, no, Im going to show people how its done here. Not in an arrogant way, but you were very confident.

I was, Mastromonaco replied. Well, I knew what I knew, and I think thats one of my strengths. I know what I know, and I know what I dont know. So if we were talking about going on a foreign trip and the National Security Council wanted to put in an extra couple of stops, I was like, No, were not going to do that. And when it came to the president, [he] was so wonderful about also understanding peoples strengths and weaknesses and knowing that, if I said that, Alyssa is probably right.

At one time he said, Remember your words have power.

He did. That had never actually occurred to me. I was very upset about something someone had said to a reporter, and I wrote a sort of unhinged e-mail to the entire senior staff. I was like, We should have each others backs, so I was very upset. I thought everyone would ignore it, but someone told the president about it, and he felt the need to talk to me about the strength of my words.

The books title comes from Mr. Obama, Mastromonaco said. Because if he was on the road and you got an e-mail that said, Who thought this was a good idea? -- which was not uncommon -- you knew that he knew you thought it was a good idea, and he wanted you to just own your decision, which I always did. It was my idea.

She told CBS This Morning that her goal was to get women more interested and excited about government.

I think that this book, hopefully, makes government a little bit more relatable, a little bit less scary, she said. Really, if you have the passion and commitment, you can do it. You dont have to be Harvard-educated with a dad who was a congressman to work in the White House.

Mastromonaco said the book underwent many iterations. I actually had a much harder time -- when I was trying to be a little bit more lofty. I struggled. I ended up on Zoloft trying to do it.

She then got advice from a friend, comedian Mindy Kaling. She said, Write one essay for every chapter and it will come. So I wrote one essay per chapter, and I got a cowriter who understood me, Lauren Oyler, and she totally pulled the great stuff out of me. And we realized this is exactly the book we wanted.

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Former Obama aide: Trump's wiretap claim is "insane" - CBS News