In the @guardian article @martinchulov paints the image of the misunderstood humanitarian, preposterously even reporting "from the mind" of Le Mesurier ....
😇😂🙄
This is not journalism but an apologetic hagiography!
On the key allegation, Chulov misrepresents the basic facts and whitewashes the admitted fraud as just "backdating receipts" ....
"Not illegal but [only] shady", - according to a former Mayday employee, this is what we are supposed to believe!
This is not what happened.
The details in @esvanana long Dutch article for @volkskrant tell a different story:
First, Le Mesurier claims the disappeared money from the WH "Hero fund" are stored in a separate safe.
Then, in order to satisfy the British accountant, Le Mesurier showed receipts he "found" that seemingly document how the 50k $ was transferred.
Because of the massive irregularities in Mayday Rescues accounts, a second Dutch accounting firm comes in half a year later - and discovers the receipts are FAKE, - *not* backdated as claimed by Chulov but fabricated.
The money has disappeared!
When faced with this discovery (based on the testimony of an honest employee), Le Mesurier finally came up with another version: he suddenly discovered he kept the money himself, as "remuneration benefits"!
This simple sequence of events, reconstructed by Volkskrant and not denied by anyone, leaves no room whatsoever for "misunderstandings" and "poor accounting" - on the contrary it reveals high criminal energy!
There was no way out for Le Mesurier.
All excuses simply don't fly as this incident was just the tip of the iceberg of a culture of grift:
the fraudulent directors received excessive salaries, yet complained they were underpaid and then granted themselves additional "benefits"!
Chulov bases his exculpatory fairytale of the misunderstood humanitarian on the whitewashing final report of the Dutch accounting firm - for lack of evidence of misappropriation, due to significant cash transactions not being recorded!
This is not news - Volkskrant knew of the report and has seen the summary. Evidently nothing in it could alter their conclusion of the main story.
And there clearly is a political motive: the governments involved wish to keep the inquiry secret!
Chulov even quotes said summary of the inquiry: ... "appear to be a result of a misunderstanding".
From which we can safely conclude that no alternative explanation to the Volkskrant article was found, the money has not reappeared but was taken by Le Mesurier as "benefit"!
But there's another interesting detail in Chulov's article: Emma Winberg, Le Mesurier's wife and partner in fraud, was suspected to have withdrawn another $55,000 - obviously in addition to the sum Le Mesurier had taken responsibility for.
What a culture of grift!
If, as the undisclosed inquiry insinuates, Mayday's problem was only that of missing records & chaotic accounting, not of missing money - why would the UK gov't (and others) stop their funding?
They decided to bury this embarassing story altogether in order to save the "brand"!
Finally, Mayday Rescue had to declare bankrupcy - a sure sign that significant amounts of money must have been missing (not just the 50k here and 55k there for the directors' extra "remunerations")!
In case you were in doubt mainstream journos have lost even the last bits of critical thinking, fact checking, etc 🙄🧐🤕
Let's all cry for the "misunderstood humanitarian" Le Mesurier who so deservedly took out $50k benefits for himself ...
It's a short report on the 24th Session of the Conference of the States Parties to the Chemical Weapons Convention:
US, Canada, NL proposed to add *2* families of chemicals to the OPCW prohibited list (incl. the "Salisbury Novichok");
Russia proposed to add *5* groups!
In the end, a compromise was reached to put *four* new chemicals (or classes) on the list; - the Western states rejected the *fifth*, on the grounds it wasn't "consistent with the guidelines of the Convention" (!?!) - whatever that means ....
There we have it:
the German gov't referred to EU and NATO for a common response to the suspected poisoning of Alexey Navalny, and the European Parliament now passes a resolution calling for an international probe & suspension of Nord Stream 2!
The resolution has no legal bearing - it is pure political posturing intended to “continue to isolate Russia in international forums” & “to prioritize the approval of EU human rights sanctions”.
How can you call for an investigation - and already anticipate the results?
Meanwhile, the Navalny story is taking on a "Skripalesque" flavour:
now it is the bottle, left in his hotel room in Tomsk!
James Le Mesurier, founder of the #WhiteHelmets, was a criminal fraudster!
There were rumours of "financial irregularities" at Mayday Rescue after his death last November, - @volkskrant now presents an account based on an official inquiry:
In short: Le Mesurier faked receipts for funds designated for a rescue op - but used the $ 50,000 as bonus payments for himself, his wife, and a third administrator!
As the case was clear he admitted the fraud.
The Western governments supporting the WhiteHelmets try their best to hide, downplay and explain away the evident fraud, - apparently in order not to tarnish the brand .....
This is preposterous: the facts speak for themselves, and reveal a high level of criminal energy!
The Courage Foundation convened a panel about the OPCW-FFM report on Douma, including a former Director General of the OPCW and a member of the Douma investigation team from the @OPCW.
In response to the leak, the OPCW denied Henderson was part of the FFM, and spin doctors were quick to suggest he was just "a consultant" (@ScottLucas_EA ), was working "on the sidelines of the FFM" (@Brian_Whit, -> medium.com/@Brian_Whit/le…), "a disgruntled employee" (Higgins) ...
- but this is not borne out by the leaked report itself, which was written on the *explicit* understanding it presented nothing less than the (authorised) findings of the engineering sub-team of the FFM!