Stephen McIntyre Profile picture
Sep 21, 2023 54 tweets 16 min read Read on X
In May 2020, a Ukrainian parliamentarian asked a question that is once again being revisited: a few months before Biden's demand for Shokin's resignation, Poroshenko, Europe and State Dept had all positively assessed progress of Prosecutor General Office. What caused change? Image
needless to say, the two prominent Ukrainians who asked that question were subsequently sanctioned by the US security state. Under the so-called "Trump administration" and remain censored to this day. But question was and is valid.
the Ukrainians had an interesting explanation that I'll get to later on. First, I'll review some known dates, while adding some details. Biden defenders say that demand for Shokin resignation arose in the "interagency". If so, records ought to be abundant in the bureaucracy
we KNOW that there was an interagency meeting on Sept 30, 2015 at which the interagency agreed that "Ukraine has made sufficient progress on its reform agenda to justify a third guarantee" and the minutes (to vast list) made no mention of Shokin firing justthenews.com/sites/default/…

Image
Image
Republicans (with usual inefficiency) have more or less totally neglected production of relevant interagency documents in Oct-Nov 2015 that would shed light on this issue, but there is an important, undiscussed available document from Nov 5, 2015 - narrowing period a lot
On Oct 23, 2015, Christina Segal-Knowles followed up her Oct 1, 2015 minutes with a final list of conditions precedent for the third loan guarantee (the one that Joe Biden later held hostage.) Image
later, on Jan 15, 2016 (on eve of meeting with Ukrainian prosecutors), Segal-Knowles (at NSC with Ciaramella and Zentos) sent document entitled "2015-11-05 CPs for Ukraine LG3_clean.docx" [CPs=Conditions Precedent]. See Pyatt Transcript Exhibits, p 143. Image
for the purposes of our chronology, the 2015-11-05 Conditions Precedent were distributed one day before Amos Hochstein's meeting with Hunter Biden and were up-to-date interagency policy prior to that meeting.
The 2015-11-05 Conditions Precedent were shown in Pyatt Transcript Exhibits, p 147-148 (the very end). In regard to Prosecutor General, they required establishment of Inspector General office in Prosecutor General Office. Nothing about firing Shokin.
Image
Image
On Oct 29, 2015, Burisma's Vadym Pozharskyi had traveled to Washington to meet with Hunter Biden, Devon Archer and Blue Star (Tramontano, Painter) about "deliverables" in respect to US. On Nov 2, 2015, Pozharskyi sent email memorializing meeting.
Burisma had far-reaching expectations from its extravagant payments to Hunter Biden, Devon Archer and (soon) Blue Star. While the arrangement is well known, far too little attention is paid to Pozharskyi's stated expectations. Which he'd reviewed with Hunter in person on Oct 29. Image
They expected Hunter to ensure that "high-ranking US officials in Ukraine (US Ambassador) and in US publicly or in private communication/comment expressing their "positive opinion" and support of Nikolay/Burisma to the highest level of decision makers here in Ukraine"
Burisma also expected "a visit of a number of widely recognized and influential current and/or former US policy-makers to Ukraine in November" with a view to "close down any cases/pursuits against" Zlochevsky. Image
as discussed in a previous thread, Hunter called Amos Hochstein's office on Nov 2 and arranged a meeting on Nov 6. Hochstein testified that it was the ONLY time that Hunter sought a meeting with him and that they discussed Burisma.
in his testimony to Senate Committee in 2020, Hochstein stated, inter alia, that (1) he wanted prosecution of Zlochevsky and Burisma; (2) that he had warned Joe Biden in late October about "Russian disinformation" pointing to Hunter's association with Burisma
(3) that Hunter told him that Joe had talked to him (Hunter) about his discussion with Hochstein and that Hunter wanted to talk directly with Hochstein to get his views on Burisma.
Hochstein's evidence was incorrect on many public details of Burisma events and may be self-serving
On Nov 13, Joe Biden announced a trip to Ukraine. Pozharskyi emailed Hunter immediately. One of his key deliverables was a "visit of a number of widely recognized and influential current and/or former US policy-makers to Ukraine in Nov". Had Hunter delivered? Beyond expectation? Image
this thread began with Burisma's Pozharskyi trip to Washington on Oct 29, 2015 to set out required deliverables to Hunter, Archer and Blue Star. The explanation from Ukr parliamentarian (Derkach) and prosecutor (Kulyk) links back to earlier thread on Chornovol's hate for Kasko Image
Readers may recall Nabuleaks exhibits showing transfers from Burisma account in Latvia to Morgan Stanley account of Rosemont Seneca Bohai. Originally presented in October 2019 by Derkach and were (uncredited) source of first hard info on size of Hunter payments.
Image
Image
There's an interesting feature to the dates in these ledgers. Though we know that payments to Hunter continued until much later, the latest listed payment to Rosemont Seneca was Nov 18, 2015. So why doesn't the ledger show ongoing later payments?
The answer is pretty clear: the Latvian bank documents were delivered to the Prosecutor General's Office in November 2015. It's a reasonable surmise that arrangements for delivery of the documents had been negotiated in or about October 2015 and delivered a few weeks later.
Kulyk was the prosecutor who succeeded in recovering $1.5 billion of funds from Yanukovich "syndicate" in 2017 - the only substantial recovery of funds. In contrast, FBI, DOJ recovered $0, despite constant bleating and complaining.
Kulyk spent next two years (to March 28, 2019) on further investigation of money laundering associated with Sergei Kurchenko, the young oligarch who appears to have acted as "wallet" for the Yanukovych syndicate (who were prior to Poroshenko syndicate, prior to Zelensky syndicate
on March 28, 2019, the second anniversary of confiscation of $1.5 billion, Prosecutor General Lutsenko announced that Kulyk had finished enormous money laundering investigation, with suspicions issued to nearly 100 people. See tsn.ua/ukrayina/sprav…
Image
more later.
@PetriKrohn @USTreasury @MoonofA I've archived copies of some of the videos using wget - a technique that I didn't know until a few years ago. For Bitchute, I had to look up the exact mp4 link in the view-source.
@Comment4_U Rather than US micro-management of its Ukrainian colony leading to reduced corruption, it appears to have dramatically exacerbated the already bad corruption. I think that this issue ought to be discussed much more as Burisma isn't only issue that deserves sunshine.
@RockKenwell Derkach was source for information that Hunter Biden was being paid $83,333 per month by Burisma, the amount first being public in October 2019. That information was not "Russian disinformation", no matter how often the mantra was repeated by US intel agencies.
Lutsenko March 28, 2019 announcement of Kulyk's report (Deputy Head, International Legal Cooperation) was both a milestone and turning point that was ignored in west. I'll discuss in separate thread but note highlights here briefly. Kulyk's team assembled more than 3000 volumes Image
Lutsenko reported a wide range of offenses associated with the Kurchenko money laundering network. One would have thought that US embassy, ostensibly so committed to "anti-corruption", would have been praising Lutsenko and Kulyk to roof tops. But they weren't.

Image
Image
Image
Lutsenko also reported that 98 people had been issued suspicions. Image
bonus points to any readers who connected Kurchenko back to the original seizure of Zlochevsky $25 million in London in 2014, about which George Kent, Pyatt and US Embassy hyperventilated and purported to blame on Shokin (while ignoring Kulyk's success in seizing $1.5 billion).
$20 million of the deposits into the Brociti (Zlochevsky) account in London had come from a Kurchenko company. Z's lawyer (Kicha) informed court that a Kurchenko company had, in 2013, purchased an oil terminal from Zlochevsky, owned by Z since 2002.
Image
Image
the UK anti-corruption prosecutor countered by observing that Kurchenko had been sanctioned on Mar 6, 2014 (only a few days after US-backed regime change) Image
Zlochevsky's lawyer argued that each of the transactions "resulted in real assets being exchanged for real cash": Image
ultimately, UK judge determined that UK prosecutors hadn't supported their ex parte seizure and released the funds. Contrary to US embassy disinformation, Shokin was NOT Prosecutor General at the time. In fact, it was Kasko (their favorite) who was then in charge of International Image
a full exegesis of US embassy disinformation and misunderstanding of the London case re seizure of Zlochevsky funds needs to be written up (I have lengthy notes on the topic).
anyway, back to March 28, 2019 and the Lutsenko-Kulyk announcement. It precipitated a weird series of events -weird even by Ukrainian-Biden corruption standards and totally unreported in west. Even as both Lutsenko and Kulyk were then attracting attention via John Solomon
in U.S., online journal ForumDaily[.]com reported that members of Poroshenko's inner circle were issued suspicions, specifically former Presidential Administration (PA) head Lozhkin, former National Bank head Gontareva, current PA deputy head Filatov forumdaily.com/genprokuratura…
ForumDaily also reported that Zlochevsky had been caught up in the Kurchenko investigation and suspicions, linking to a previous ForumDaily article on Mar 26, 2019 forumdaily.com/podkupit-bajde…

Image
Image
the March 28, 2019 ForumDaily article (the sourcing of which is unclear) was immediately cited by Ukrainian media to disseminate allegations against Poroshenko's inner circle: ; ; vesti.ua/strana/330571-…
unian.net/politics/10496…
tsn.ua/ukrayina/sprav…
Within minutes, the Prosecutor General Office walked back the suspicions against Poroshenko's inner circle and began a process of icing and eventually firing Kulyk. Unian ; Facebook ; TCH unian.net/politics/10496…
facebook.com/lysenko.andrii…
tsn.ua/ukrayina/rechn…
Image
later that day, Kulyk's files were removed from his office. Ultimately, Kulyk's investigation, with its 3000 volumes of evidence, appears to have been transferred to NABU (controlled by US Embassy) where it seems to have fizzled out without anything being done. Kulyk later fired
subsequently, Kulyk - praised by Chornovol as the prosecutor who recovered $1.5 billion of embezzled money, the ONLY such recovery to date - joined Derkach in his press conferences on Ukrainian corruption under Biden regency, to which Kulyk brought receipts.
Kulyk was subsequently sanctioned on Jan 10, 2021 by Treasury under so-called "Trump" administration, for disseminating supposed "Russian disinformation". But, when one looks at backstory, Kulyk had paid his dues as Ukrainian prosecutor with actual accomplishments
while Kulyk was carrying out his monumental investigation into Kurchenko money-laundering syndicate, he was simultaneously being investigated by NABU on charges of illegal enrichment in 2011-2015, including a complaint that he took a 10-day vacation in Bulgaria by car
ultimately, it's a herculean and probably impossible task to sort out which Ukrainian is more corrupt. What does seem certain is that there's little to no reason to trust George Kent or Amos Hochstein on such matters. Or for US embassy to be micro-managing.
back to the original question of what changed regarding Shokin in Oct-Nov 2015 as asked by Derkach and Kulyk having established that Kulyk had exhaustively investigated Kurchenko money laundering in which Zlochevsky was reported in 2019 to be a participant. Image
right now, none of us KNOWS what triggered the change. We KNOW that Vadym Pozharskyi, Zlochevsky's #2, visited Hunter Biden, Archer and Blue Star in Washington on Oct 29, 2015, following up with a memo on "deliverables" on Nov 2, 2015
We KNOW that Hunter Biden requested a meeting with Amos Hochstein on Nov 2, that they met on Nov 6 and that this was only such meeting ever requested by Hunter of Hochstein and that Hunter initiated discussion of Burisma.
here's Kulyk and Derkach's explanation for the sudden concern by Burisma and Biden. They stated in May 2020 that the Kurchenko money laundering investigation had discovered $3.4 million payment of "laundered money" to Rosemont Seneca Bohai Image
while there has been much publicity to the issue of quid pro quo, if the funds (quid pro quo or not) resulted from money laundering (as Kulyk believed), the situation is much worse. Image
we also know from Tetiana Chornovol that Shokin, Chornovol and Tyshchenko had had an explosive meeting with US embassy favorite Kasko (then head of International) about his failure to obtain money laundering documents from Latvia, such that Shokin set up parallel channel
the dates on the ledgers from Latvia indicate that
Shokin's direct channel to Latvia (circumventing the obfuscating Kasko) began yielding results in Oct-Nov 2015, exactly as US embassy/Biden began seeking Shokin's head.

• • •

Missing some Tweet in this thread? You can try to force a refresh
 

Keep Current with Stephen McIntyre

Stephen McIntyre Profile picture

Stay in touch and get notified when new unrolls are available from this author!

Read all threads

This Thread may be Removed Anytime!

PDF

Twitter may remove this content at anytime! Save it as PDF for later use!

Try unrolling a thread yourself!

how to unroll video
  1. Follow @ThreadReaderApp to mention us!

  2. From a Twitter thread mention us with a keyword "unroll"
@threadreaderapp unroll

Practice here first or read more on our help page!

More from @ClimateAudit

Jun 8
in 2019 and 2020, there was a huge amount of interest in the Strzok-Page texts, but almost no attention was paid to the fact that the texts had been heavily "curated" before reaching the public and that some key topics were missing.

One of the key topics that was missing from the Strzok-Page texts (as curated) was any mention of the interview of Steele's Primary Sub-Source in late January 2017. Given that the FBI had insisted on inclusion of Steele dossier allegations in the Intelligence Community Assessment dated January 6, 2017, this was a central FBI issue at the time and the lack of any reference in the Strzok-Page texts as originally presented is noteworthy.

Readers may recall that the very first tranche of Strzok-Page texts, released in Feb 2018, contained a long gap from mid-December 2017 to mid-May 2018 - from the ICA to appointment of Mueller. This is the very period in which the Crossfire investigation metastasized into the lawfare that undermined the incoming administration. The fact that this period was separately missing from both Strzok and Lisa Page has never been adequately explained. As an aside, it seems odd that the FBI can retrieve emails and texts from targets, but not from their own employees.

Subsequently, a tranche of texts from the missing period was released, but these were also heavily curated and contained no texts that relate to the Primary Subsource.

However, from an an exhibit in the Flynn case , we //KNOW// that, in the late evening of January 13, 2017, Strzok and Page texted about the Primary Subsource, less than two weeks prior to the interview (which began on January 24, 2017). The message wasn't interpretable in real time, but we (Hans Mahncke) were subsequently able to connect it to the Danchenko interview via the reference to the "Womble" law firm, with which Danchenko's lawyer, Mark Schamel, was then associated. We also learned that Schamel was friends with and namedropped Lisa Monaco.

But other than this single excerpt from the Flynn exhibits, I haven't located anything in any of the other Strzok texts than can be plausibly connected to the critical interviews of the Primary Subsource.

I think that there are some Strzok emails from Jan 19 and Jan 22, 2017 that may refer to the pending Primary Subsource interview, that I'll discuss next.

One useful thing that the Weaponization Committee could do would be to publish a complete and unexpurgated set of Strzok-Page texts. Given the interest created by the highly expurgated version, one wonders what an expurgated and unbowdlerized version might yield.courtlistener.com/docket/6234142…Image
In the volume of Strzok emails released on October 31, 2019, there was an almost entirely redacted thread dated January 19 and January 22, 2017, a couple of days before the Primary Subsource interview on January 24, 2017, which look to me like they have a good chance of relating to the PSS interview.

The thread began with an email from FBI Office of General Council (OGC) - Sally Anne Moyer or Kevin Clinesmith - to Strzok and a CD subordinate, with a very short subject line.

We know that the PSS interview was lawyered up and carried out under a sweetheart queen-for-a-day deal that was usually only available to highly placed Democrats (Huma Abedin, Cheryl Mills etc.) So involvement of OGC in negotiation of the PSS interview is expected.Image
at 6:47 pm on Thursday, Jan 19, 2017, Strzok's CD subordinate wrote back that "here's what we have to decide ASAP". The issue is totally redacted, naturally. (This is one day before inauguration.) Image
Read 12 tweets
May 12
in April 2022, Mark Steyn, on his GB News show
,
commented on recently released UK COVID data, claiming "the third booster shots so zealously promoted by the British state, and its groupthink media has failed, and in fact exposed you to significantly greater risk of infection, hospitalization and death."
Steyn showed images of five tables from official statistical publications to support his claims.
In April 2023, Ofcom, which, in addition to its ordinary regulatory role, had taken a special interest in vaccine advocacy, ruled that Steyn's "presentation of UK Health Security Agency data
and their use to draw conclusions materially misled the audience. In breach of Rule 2.2 of the Broadcasting Code" - a very damaging finding that Steyn has appealed.


I haven't followed this case. However, as it happens, I had taken an interest in UK COVID data about 3 months earlier, as it was one of the few jurisdictions that published case and hospitalization rates by vaccination status.


Also, to refresh readers on the contemporary context, early 2022 was the period in which COVID lockdowns and overall alarm began to decline.

At the time, I observed that the UK data showed that the case rate for triple vax was //higher// than among unvax. Three months later, Steyn (as discussed below) made a similar claim, for which he was censured.

Although the UK authorities conspicuously refrained from including this result in their summary or conclusions, they were obviously aware of the conundrum, since their publication included a curious disclaimer by UK authorities that actual case data "should not be used" to estimate vaccine effectiveness. I pointed this odd disclaimer out in this earlier thread, also noting that health authorities in Ontario and elsewhere had previously used such data to promote vaccine uptake and that the reasoning behind this disclaimer needed to be closely examined and parsed.

All of these issues turned up later in the Ofcom decision re Steyn.

Ofcom ruled that Steyn's presentation was "materially misleading" because
(1) he failed to take account of "fundamental biases" in age structure of vax and unvax groups i.e. unvax group was skewed younger, vax group skewed older; and
(2) he failed to include the disclaimer that "This raw data should not be used to estimate vaccine effectiveness as the data does not take into account inherent biases present such as differences in risk, behaviour and testing in the vaccinated and unvaccinated populations”.steynonline.com/mark-steyn-sho…
ofcom.org.uk/__data/assets/…
Image
in this thread, I'll re-examine Steyn's analysis. I've transcribed all the numbers in the tables and done further calculations to check his claims.

First, case rates. Steyn first showed an important table showing the population by 5-year age group and vax status, observing that the total population of triply vax (boosted) was approximately equal to the population of unboosted, observing that this facilitated comparison. Steyn: "Let's take a look at this, as you can see from a pool of 63 million down at the bottom there, 63 million, there are 32 million who are triple vaccinated. That leaves just under 31 million, who are either double single or unvaccinated. So we have two groups of similar size, 31, 32 million. So it's relatively easy to weigh the merits of the third shot upon Group A versus group B."

He then showed a table of cases by age group and vax status, pointing out that the total number of boosted cases was approximately double the number of unboosted cases: "So the triple vaccinated in March were responsible for just over a million COVID cases and everybody else 475,000 COVID cases. So the triple vaccinated are contracting COVID at approximately twice the rate of the double, single and unvaccinated. Got that? If you get the booster shot, you've got twice as high a chance of getting the COVID. In the United Kingdom, there's twice as many people with the third booster shot who got the COVID, as the people who never had the booster shot."Image
Image
Ofcom purported to rebut Steyn's analysis as shown in excerpt below. They observed that proportion of unvax in younger age groups was much higher than in older age groups and that the "simple comparison between the two groups made by Mark Steyn failed to take into account these inherent biases".

However, Ofcom failed to show that there would be a different outcome in the more complex analysis in which age groups were allowed for.

As it turns out, in regard to case rates, Steyn's conclusions, if anything, under-stated the phenomenon, as shown next.Image
Read 11 tweets
Apr 19
here is a thread from 2023 in which Eric Ciaramella's "yikes" is placed in a more detailed context.

In this thread, I suggested that the linkage was connected to Jan 21, 2016 meeting of Ukrainian prosecutors with State Dept officials, noting that Jamie Gusack (reporting to Bridget Brink) had distributing the first demand for Shokin's head (Nov 22 TPs)Image
Image
as pointed out in that thread, Gusack (State Dept) had been coordinating with Ciaramella (NSC) prior to arrival of Ukr prosecutors in Jan 2016, referring to Shokin replacement.

State Dept cited "diamond prosecutors case" as big deal. But what happened to it next? A long story. Image
Bridget Brink, Jamie Gusack's boss, reported to Victoria Nuland. Brink was appointed Ambassador to Ukraine in April 2022. Unanimous approval by Senate in early days of war at the exact time that US and UK were sabotaging the peace deal negotiated in Istanbul Image
Read 4 tweets
Mar 17
as observed yesterday, , after 2014 US coup, the tsunami of billion dollar US/IMF loans was associated with unprecedented embezzlement by Ukr oligarchs thru corrupt Ukr banking system. Rescues of failed banks (mostly unnoticed in west) were markers
in today's thread, I'll provide a short bibliography of articles (mostly Ukrainian language via google translate) on the Ukr banking corruption crisis that began and exploded after the 2014 US coup, while Biden, Blinken, Nuland et al were running Ukraine
once one searches specifically for the topic, there are interesting references, but the topic has received essentially next to zero coverage in the west. I'll take myself as an example. Despite following Ukr affairs quite closely, my prior knowledge was three vignettes.
Read 15 tweets
Mar 16
May 25, 2021: US DOJ announced indictment & arrest of Austrian banker Peter Weinzierl


Mar 13, 2024: we learn that Alexander Smirnov was an FBI informant against Weinzierl and had lured Weinzierl to UK on behalf of FBI for arrest justice.gov/usao-edny/pr/t…
archive.is/zO1rt

Image
Image
the DOJ charges against Austrian banker Weinzierl, filed during first six months of Biden admin, pertained to allegations that payments made via Meinl Bank in Austria by Brazilian construction company Odebrecht were connected to evasion of taxes in Brazil. Image
if the concern of US DOJ and FBI with administration of Brazilian tax collection seems somewhat quirky, there may be an ulterior motive: Meinl Bank had a central role in the looting of Ukrainian banks during the 2014-2016 Biden administration of Ukraine. Image
Read 11 tweets
Mar 3
Valentyn Nalyvaichenko, named by NYT as architect of 2014 post-Maidan takeover of Ukrainian intelligence by CIA, is former head of Ukrainian SBU. His comments on Biden corruption deserve attention, but have been ignored.archive.is/zXXQV
on October 10, 2019, early in the Trump impeachment saga, Nalyvaichenko published an op ed in Wall St Journal saying "alliance with US depends on answering questions about Bidens and election interference" [by Ukraine] archive.is/wsrjP
Image
in that editorial, Naluvaichenko, the former SBU hear, stated that Ukraine had responsibility to investigate allegations that Ukraine interfered in 2016 election (a separate issue from Russian interference) and whether Burisma hired Hunter Biden for "cynical purposes". Image
Read 6 tweets

Did Thread Reader help you today?

Support us! We are indie developers!


This site is made by just two indie developers on a laptop doing marketing, support and development! Read more about the story.

Become a Premium Member ($3/month or $30/year) and get exclusive features!

Become Premium

Don't want to be a Premium member but still want to support us?

Make a small donation by buying us coffee ($5) or help with server cost ($10)

Donate via Paypal

Or Donate anonymously using crypto!

Ethereum

0xfe58350B80634f60Fa6Dc149a72b4DFbc17D341E copy

Bitcoin

3ATGMxNzCUFzxpMCHL5sWSt4DVtS8UqXpi copy

Thank you for your support!

Follow Us!

:(