That Russian Guy Who Attended the Trump Tower Meeting Is Almost Definitely a Spy

[riversedge]

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A month and a half ago, the New York Times obtained emails in which Donald Trump Jr. set up a meeting in Trump Tower with Russian officials who were promising him sensitive information, on his father’s opponent, that would help the Trump campaign. A few days later, it emerged that the meeting also included Rinat Akhmetshin, a figure whose name was not included in the first stories about the meeting, but who is a key figure in the meeting because he is almost certainly a Russian spy.

Today’s Times has a follow-up story on Akhmetshin, with three reporters sharing a byline. The story does not call Akhmetshin a Russian spy, because that is not a charge that a newspaper can prove, short of extraordinary evidence like an email from Akhmetshin saying, “By the way, I’m a Russian spy.” (And that email does not exist because — unlike, say, Donald Trump Jr. — Akhmetshin is not a complete idiot.) Instead, the headline cautiously calls Akhmetshin a “Lobbyist” who has a “Web of Russian Connections.”

But this massively understates the story’s conclusions. Donald Trump has a web of Russian connections. Akhmetshin is (again, almost certainly) a Russian spy. The shadiness of Akhmetshin’s cover story comes through over and over in the report. Akhmetshin “told some journalists that he worked with a military counterintelligence unit, but said he never joined Russian intelligence services — unlike his father, sister and godfather,” the Times reports, skeptically. He founded a “think tank” with the ostensible purpose of promoting democratization, but which was, in reality, “essentially a vehicle to burnish the reputation of one client, Akezhan Kazhegeldin, an ex-K.G.B. officer and the former prime minister of Kazakhstan.”

Meanwhile, Akhmetshin’s résumé contains gaping voids:
...............................



And his explanation for how he ended up in the meeting is just a tad bit suspicious:

Mr. Akhmetshin, a Washington resident, has told reporters that he just happened to be lunching with Ms. Veselnitskaya in Manhattan that day when she spontaneously invited him to the meeting with the president’s son, son-in-law Jared Kushner and Mr. Manafort. He did not explain why she wanted him there..............................................

[Not Ruth]

1. If he is a spy, shouldn't he be arrested?

[Botany]

2. Sounds logical to me.

Mr. Akhmetshin, a Washington resident, has told reporters that he just happened to be lunching with Ms. Veselnitskaya in Manhattan that day when she spontaneously invited him to the meeting with the president’s son, son-in-law Jared Kushner and Mr. Manafort.




Natasha, Boris you come with me to the Trump Tower for lunch today?

Boris, Sure darling but why?

Natasha, Oh I don’t know. They have good Borscht soup there.

[gratuitous]

3. Oh yeah

That happens to me at least a couple of times a week. You know, you're just having lunch with someone who's definitely not a foreign agent or a spy, and she says, "Hey, I'm going to a meeting this afternoon. Want to tag along?" I'll tell you, it's so common it's beginning to infringe on my day drinking time.

[Botany]

4. And it is really common too when Ms. Veselnitskaya's clinet, Preverzon Group, that was ...

.... washing Russian mob money through NYC real estate had the DoJ drop all charges
against it 10 months after the meeting and settle for pennies on the dollar.

But really what about HRC's emails?

[riversedge]

5. Well, yah know--just gotta happened.

NOPE,

[brooklynite]

6. "Spy" is such an UGLY word...how about "man of mystery"?