Pages

Sunday, October 13, 2019

Bill Barr In Rome

From a link I got at GP, which summarizes a NYT story--William Barr and John Durham’s visit to Italy:

The exclusive disclosure made by InsideOver on 28 September has been confirmed: William Barr, Attorney General of the United States, was in Italy for a few days from 25 until 27 September to gather evidence relating to “Spygate”. As George Papadopoulos, former member of the foreign policy advisory panel in Donald Trump’s presidential election campaign in 2016 told us, Barr was in Rome, at Palazzo Margherita – where the US embassy is located – in a particularly feverish few days for the US administration as Nancy Pelosi announced the launch of the impeachment proceedings against the President on account of the Kievgate scandal. 
As the New York Times confirms, William Barr arrived in Italy around 25-26 September and met  Italian government officials on Friday 27 September. According to former Justice Department officials, the justice ministry asked several foreign countries, including Italy, to cooperate and hand over certain documents relating to the 2016 elections. Attorney General Barr’s trip to Italy was also confirmed by the Washington Post: the US Justice Department asked officials of the Conte government to provide whatever support was necessary to United States Attorney John Durham who was appointed to investigate the murky origins of Russiagate. According to the Washington Post, this was not Barr’s first visit to our country. 
According to a report in the Daily Beast, when Barr arrived at the US embassy in Palazzo Margherita in Rome he asked for two things: a conference room to meet high level Italian security agents where he could be sure that nobody could listen in and a chair for United States Attorney John Durham who was appointed by Barr to cast light on Russiagate.
 
That's significant. No chairs for FBI or CIA reps--because they weren't there.


An official at the US embassy in Rome reportedly disclosed to the Daily Beast that William Barr’s visit to Italy was unexpected. According to the American news outlet, Barr and Durham were particularly interested in what the Italian secret services knew about Joseph Mifsud, the Maltese lecturer at Link University at the centre of the American Russiagate affair, the person who first – according to the enquiry by special counsel Robert Mueller – revealed to George Papadopoulos the existence of the compromising emails about  Hillary Clinton. The article in the Daily Beast sensationally goes on to say that Joseph Mifsud had sought the police protection in Italy after “disappearing” from Link University, Rome where he worked. 

Exactly. The trip was unexpected--unexpected by the US State Department and its representatives in Rome. NOT unexpected by the Italians, you can be sure, which means extremely high level contacts before the trip and NO LEAKS. The explanation comes in the final paragraph.

Mifsud reportedly provided a taped deposition in which he explained why “some persons” could do him harm. A source from the Italian Ministry of Justice, speaking on condition of anonymity, reportedly confirmed that Barr and Durham listened to the tape and there was supposedly an exchange of information between the US attorneys and Italian intelligence. 
“As previously announced by the US Department of Justice, a team led by the United States Attorney John Durham is investigating the origins of the counter-espionage probe of the United States during the 2016 Trump presidential campaign”, commented Kerri Kupec, spokesman of the Department of Justice. “Durham is gathering information from numerous sources, including several foreign countries. At Attorney General Barr’s request, the President has contacted other countries to ask them to introduce the Attorney General and Mr. Durham to the appropriate officials”. There must, therefore, have been a telephone call between Prime Minister Giuseppe Conte and Donald Trump.

I said NO LEAKS above, but who wants to guess that House Dems knew about this trip through their moles on the NSC? 

No comments:

Post a Comment