TRUMP ASSOCIATE PAUL MANAFORT 'CHANGED HIS STORY COMPLETELY'
TO PROTECT SUSPECTED MEMBER OF RUSSIAN INTELLIGENCE, PROSECUTORS SAY
BY CRISTINA MAZA at Newsweek
"SNIP....
At the heart of the matter is whether Manafort was helping Kilimnik lobby for a peace plan for Ukraine that would be beneficial to the Kremlin. Pro-Russian separatists have been fighting with Ukraine’s forces and destabilizing the country since 2014, and Russia has an interest in creating facts on the ground that will allow Moscow to control its neighbor. Efforts to promote a peace plan for Ukraine appear to have continued well after Manafort was indicted, according to prosecutors. Manafort and his business partner Rick Gates also allegedly made efforts to conceal their contacts with Kilimnik, including a meeting that took place in Manhattan in August 2016, just weeks after the Republican National Convention.
The men allegedly discussed sanctions relief for Russia.
Prosecutors also suggested that Manafort was economically dependent on Ukraine’s pro-Russian former President Viktor Yanukovych and his political party the Party of Regions. Yanukovych fled to Moscow in 2014 after a pro-Western social movement ousted him from power. Manafort played a key role in bolstering Yanukovych’s image and helping him win the presidency.
Noting that Manafort had a “liquidity issue” during the 2016 campaign, prosecutors said that “Mr. Yanukovych had fled in 2014 from the Ukraine, and there was a dramatic drop in income that was coming in to Mr. Manafort.”
.....SNIP"