Boom da boom boom: Boris Johnson in spotlight as questions raised over Russian influence on UK

[deminks]

Three senior past and present Foreign Office ministers, including the foreign secretary, Boris Johnson, were targeted by individuals identified by the FBI last week as central to their investigation into Trump-Russia collusion, the Observer has learned.

Tom Watson, deputy leader of the Labour party, called the revelations “extraordinary” and said the government must say whether other ministers were targeted or had meetings. The reports from the US had shocked MPs, he said, and it was vital to know if the Russian state had also sought to influence British politics.

The Observer has learned of meetings and encounters between British ministers and two individuals named in FBI indictments unsealed last week – George Papadopoulos, a foreign policy adviser for Donald Trump’s campaign, and a “London professor” with high-level connections to the Russian state, subsequently identified as a Maltese academic, Joseph Mifsud.

(snip)

The revelation comes as the Observer investigation into foreign influence places him in a web of relationships between a known Russian spy, Sergey Nalobin, expelled from Britain in 2015, and Matthew Elliott, the chief executive of Vote Leave, the official Leave campaign headed by Johnson.

Watson said: “We’re starting to have a much clearer picture from America of how the Russian state sought to influence the US election and I think there are multiple questions to be asked about how and in what ways the Russian state may have been exerting influence in British politics. Given the gravity of the allegations against Mr Papadopoulos, the government should make public any meetings these two individuals had with British officials and what was discussed.”

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https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2017/nov/04/boris-johnson-brexit-russia-trump

[DavidDvorkin]

1. How can anyone be suspicious of that honest, intelligent face?

[OnDoutside]

2. Malcolm Nance alluded to another Atomic country

Having been done by the Russians as well, on Friday night. If there's more to this Johnson story, it would be huge in a brexit context.

[Madam45for2923]

3. Papadopoulos' prof/🇷🇺agent Mifsud told colleague he'd be meeting Boris Johnson 4 dinner re Brexit

Papadopoulos' prof/🇷🇺agent Mifsud told a colleague he'd be “meeting Boris Johnson for dinner re Brexit"‼️

Boris Johnson in spotlight as questions raised over Russian influence on UK
Foreign secretary among three ministers targeted by people linked to FBI investigation into Donald Trump’s alleged collusion with Moscow

SNIP/
Three senior past and present Foreign Office ministers, including the foreign secretary, Boris Johnson, were targeted by individuals identified by the FBI last week as central to their investigation into Trump-Russia collusion, the Observer has learned.

Tom Watson, deputy leader of the Labour party, called the revelations “extraordinary” and said the government must say whether other ministers were targeted or had meetings. The reports from the US had shocked MPs, he said, and it was vital to know if the Russian state had also sought to influence British politics.

The Observer has learned of meetings and encounters between British ministers and two individuals named in FBI indictments unsealed last week – George Papadopoulos, a foreign policy adviser for Donald Trump’s campaign, and a “London professor” with high-level connections to the Russian state, subsequently identified as a Maltese academic, Joseph Mifsud.

Alok Sharma, a Foreign Office minister until June this year and MP for Reading West, confirmed he had met Mifsud “a couple of times” and he had attended a fundraising dinner in his constituency on 19 October this year, where he had “briefly greeted” him.

An email from Mifsud to a colleague, seen by the Observer and uncovered by Byline, the crowdfunded independent journalism site, revealed Mifsud had told a colleague he would be “meeting Boris Johnson for dinner re Brexit” on that date. Sharma confirmed Johnson was the guest speaker at the event.


More: https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2017/nov/04/boris-johnson-brexit-russia-trump?CMP=share_btn_tw