WASHINGTON: The Justice Department has charged a Russian-born US citizen and former adviser to Donald Trump’s 2016 presidential campaign with working for a sanctioned Russian state television network and laundering the proceeds.
Indictments announced Thursday allege that Dimitri Simes and his wife received over $1 million dollars and a personal car and driver in exchange for work they did for Russia’s Channel One since June 2022. The network was sanctioned by the US in 2022 over Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.
Simes, 76, and his wife, Anastasia Simes, have a home in Virginia and are believed to be in Russia.
“These defendants allegedly violated sanctions that were put in place in response to Russia’s illegal aggression in Ukraine,” US Attorney Matthew M. Graves said in a statement announcing the charges. “Such violations harm our national security interests — a fact that Dimitri Simes, with the deep experience he gained in national affairs after fleeing the Soviet Union and becoming a US citizen, should have uniquely appreciated.”
The indictments come at a time of renewed concern about Russian efforts to meddle with the upcoming US election using online disinformation and propaganda. On Wednesday federal authorities announced charges against two employees of the Russian media organization RT accused of covertly funding a Tennessee company that produced pro-Russian content.
Simes and the Washington think tank he led, the Center for the National Interest, figured prominently in special counsel Robert Mueller’s investigation into Russian interference in the 2016 presidential election and potential ties to the Trump campaign.
The report chronicles interactions that the Soviet-born Simes, who immigrated to the US in the 1970s, had with assorted figures in Trump’s orbit, including Trump’s son-in-law Jared Kushner.
Before one such meeting, according to the Mueller report, Simes sent Kushner a letter detailing potential talking points for Trump about Russia and also passed along derogatory information about Bill Clinton that was then forwarded to other representatives of the campaign.
Simes’s think tank, which was founded by former President Richard Nixon, helped arrange a foreign policy speech at the Mayflower Hotel in Washington at which Simes introduced Trump, according to the report. Among those present was Sergei Kislyak, then the Russian ambassador to the US
Simes was never charged with any crime in relation to the investigation.
After the report was released, Simes defended himself in an interview in The Washington Post: “I did not see anything in the Mueller report that in any way that would indicate any questionable activity on my part or on the center’s part.”
A second indictment alleges that Anastasia Simes, 55, received funds from sanctioned Russian businessman Alexander Udodov. Udodov was sanctioned last year for his support for the Russian government. He is the former brother-in-law of Russian Prime Minister Mikhail Mishustin and has been linked to business dealings with both of them. Udodov also has been investigated for money laundering.
It was not immediately clear if either defendant had a lawyer who could speak on their behalf. An attorney who previously represented Simes said he was no longer representing him. The Trump campaign did not immediately return a message seeking comment Thursday.
In an interview with The New York Times before the charges were announced, Simes, who appears regularly on Channel One, defended the work he was doing.
“I assumed that what I was saying on Russian TV would not be to the liking of the Biden administration, but I also assumed that as long as it was just my opinion and was presented as such, it was not something for which I could be prosecuted,” he told the newspaper.
Former 2016 Trump campaign adviser is charged over his work for sanctioned Russian TV
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Former 2016 Trump campaign adviser is charged over his work for sanctioned Russian TV
Palestinian TV says Israeli strike kills 5 journalists in Gaza
- The Committee to Protect Journalists’ Middle East arm said the organization was devastated
GAZA: A Palestinian TV channel affiliated with a militant group said five of its journalists were killed Thursday in an Israeli strike on their vehicle in Gaza, with Israel’s military saying it had targeted a “terrorist cell.”
A missile hit the journalists’ broadcast truck as it was parked in the Nuseirat refugee camp in central Gaza, according to a statement from their employer, Al-Quds Today.
It is affiliated with Islamic Jihad, whose militants have fought alongside Hamas in the Gaza Strip and took part in the October 7, 2023 attack on Israel that sparked the war.
The channel identified the five staffers as Faisal Abu Al-Qumsan, Ayman Al-Jadi, Ibrahim Al-Sheikh Khalil, Fadi Hassouna and Mohammed Al-Lada’a.
They were killed “while performing their journalistic and humanitarian duty,” the statement said.
“We affirm our commitment to continue our resistant media message,” it added.
The Israeli military said in its own statement that it had conducted “a precise strike on a vehicle with an Islamic Jihad terrorist cell inside in the area of Nuseirat.”
It added that “prior to the strike, numerous steps were taken to mitigate the risk of harming civilians.”
According to witnesses in Nuseirat, a missile fired by an Israeli aircraft hit the broadcast vehicle, which was parked outside Al-Awda Hospital, setting the vehicle on fire and killing those inside.
The Committee to Protect Journalists’ Middle East arm said the organization was “devastated by the reports that five journalists and media workers were killed inside their broadcasting vehicle by an Israeli strike.”
“Journalists are civilians and must always be protected,” it added in a statement on social media.
The Palestinian Journalists Syndicate said last week that more than 190 journalists had been killed and at least 400 injured since the start of the war in Gaza.
It was triggered by the Hamas-led October 7 attack last year, which resulted in 1,208 deaths, mostly civilians, according to an AFP tally of Israeli official figures.
Israel’s retaliatory military campaign has killed at least 45,361 people in Gaza, a majority of them civilians, according to figures from the Hamas-run territory’s health ministry that the UN considers reliable.
Palestinian Authority clashes with Al Jazeera over Jenin coverage
- Palestinian Authority security forces have battled Islamist fighters in Jenin, as they try to control one of the historic centers of militancy in the West Bank ahead of a likely shakeout in Palestinian politics after the Gaza war
JERUSALEM: Al Jazeera television has clashed with the Palestinian Authority over its coverage of the weeks-long standoff between Palestinian security forces and militant fighters in the occupied West Bank city of Jenin.
Fatah, the faction which controls the Palestinian Authority, condemned the Qatari-headquartered network, which has reported extensively on the clashes in Jenin, saying it was sowing division in “our Arab homeland in general and in Palestine in particular.” It encouraged Palestinians not to cooperate with the network.
Israel closed down Al Jazeera’s operations in Israel in May, saying it threatened national security. In September, it ordered the network’s bureau in Ramallah, to close for 45 days after an intelligence assessment that the offices were being used to support terrorist activities.
“Al Jazeera has successfully maintained its professionalism throughout its coverage of the unfolding events in Jenin,” it said in a statement on Tuesday.
Palestinian Authority security forces have battled Islamist fighters in Jenin, as they try to control one of the historic centers of militancy in the West Bank ahead of a likely shakeout in Palestinian politics after the Gaza war.
Forces of the PA, which exercises limited self-rule in the West Bank, moved into Jenin in early December, clashing daily with fighters from Hamas and Islamic Jihad, both of which are supported by Iran.
The standoff has fueled bitter anger on both sides, deepening the divisions which have long existed between the Palestinian factions and their supporters.
Al Jazeera said its broadcasts fairly presented the views of both sides.
“The voices of both the Palestinian resistance and the Spokesperson of the Palestinian National Security Forces have always been present on Al Jazeera’s screens,” Al Jazeera said.
‘Like a dream’: AFP photographer’s return to Syria
- “We didn’t dare to imagine that Assad could fall because his presence was so anchored in us,” said Al-Doumy
- Award-winning photographer has spent the last few years covering migrant crisis for AFP’s Lille bureau in northern France
DOUMA: AFP photographer Sameer Al-Doumy never dreamed he would be able to return to the hometown in Syria that he escaped through a tunnel seven years ago after it was besieged by Bashar Assad’s forces.
Douma, once a militant stronghold near Damascus, suffered terribly for its defiance of the former regime, and was the victim of a particularly horrific chemical weapons attack in 2018.
“It is like a dream for me today to find myself back here,” he said.
“The revolution was a dream, getting out of a besieged town and of Syria was a dream, as it is now being able to go back.
“We didn’t dare to imagine that Assad could fall because his presence was so anchored in us,” said the 26-year-old.
“My biggest dream was to return to Syria at a moment like this after 13 years of war, just as it was my biggest dream in 2017 to leave for a new life,” said the award-winning photographer who has spent the last few years covering the migrant crisis for AFP’s Lille bureau in northern France.
“I left when I was 19,” said Sameer, all of whose immediate family are in exile, apart from his sister.
“This is my home, all my memories are here, my childhood, my adolescence. I spent my life in Douma in this house my family had to flee and where my cousin now lives.
“The house hasn’t changed, although the top floor was destroyed in the bombardments.
“The sitting room is still the same, my father’s beloved library hasn’t changed. He would settle down there every morning to read the books that he had collected over the years — it was more important to him than his children.
“I went looking for my childhood stuff that my mother kept for me but I could not find it. I don’t know if it exists anymore.
“I haven’t found any comfort here, perhaps because I haven’t found anyone from my family or people I was close to. Some have left the country and others were killed or have disappeared.
“People have been through so much over the last 13 years, from the peaceful protests of the revolution, to the war and the siege and then being forced into exile.
“My memories are here but they are associated with the war which started when I was 13. What I lived through was hard, and what got me through was my family and friends, and they are no longer here.
“The town has changed. I remember the bombed buildings, the rubble. Today life has gone back to a kind of normal as the town waits for people to return.”
Douma was besieged by Assad’s forces from the end of 2012, with Washington blaming his forces for a chemical attack in the region that left more than 1,400 people dead the following year.
Sameer’s career as a photojournalist began when he and his brothers began taking photos of what was happening around them.
“After the schools closed I started to go out filming the protests with my brothers here in front of the main mosque, where the first demonstration in Douma was held after Friday prayers, and where the first funerals of the victims were also held.
“I set up my camera on the first floor of a building which overlooks the mosque and then changed my clothes afterwards so I would not be recognized and arrested. Filming the protests was banned.
“When the security forces attacked, I would take the SIM card out of my phone and the memory card out of my camera and put them in my mouth.”
That way he could swallow them if he was caught.
In May 2017, Sameer fled through a tunnel dug by the militants and eventually found himself in Idlib with former fighters and their families.
“I took the name Sameer Al-Doumy (Sameer from Douma) to affirm that I belonged somewhere,” even though he was exiled, he said. “I stopped using my first name, Motassem, to protect my family living in Damascus.
“In France I have a happy and stable life. I have a family, friends and a job. But I am not rooted to any particular place. When I went back to Syria, I felt I had a country.
“When you are abroad, you get used to the word ‘refugee’ and you get on with your life and make a big effort to integrate in a new society. But your country remains the place that accepts you as you are. You don’t have to prove anything.
“When I left Syria, I never thought one day I would be able to return. When the news broke, I couldn’t believe it. It was impossible Assad could fall. Lots of people are still in shock and are afraid. It is hard to get your head around how a regime that filled people with so much fear could collapse.
“When I returned to the Al-Midan district of Damascus (which had long resisted the regime), I could not stop myself crying.
“I am sad not to be with my loved ones. But I know they will return, even if it takes a while.
“My dream now is that one day we will all come together again in Syria.”
Rights group condemns Sudan’s RSF for journalist’s ‘heinous’ killing
- Hanan Adam and her brother died during an attack on their home in Wad Al-Asha
The International Federation of Journalists has condemned the killing of Sudanese journalist Hanan Adam by the Rapid Support Forces, describing it as a “heinous” crime.
The media rights group called for urgent action to address the escalating climate of fear and violence against journalists in Sudan.
Adam, who worked for the Ministry of Culture and Information in Gezira state and was a correspondent for Al-Maidan, the newspaper of the Sudanese Communist Party, was killed alongside her brother, Youssef Adam, during an RSF attack on their home in Wad Al-Asha on Dec. 8.
“We mourn the loss of our colleague, Hanan Adam, and her brother Youssef, and extend our deepest condolences to the family,” IFJ General Secretary Anthony Bellanger said in a statement on Tuesday.
“The IFJ calls on the Sudanese government to launch an investigation and take concrete action to end the climate of fear and violence that journalists endure in the country.”
Her employer, Al-Maidan newspaper, released a statement on Facebook mourning Adam’s death, highlighting her dedication to journalism armed with “only paper and pen.”
Adam is the sixth journalist killed in Sudan this year, making it the deadliest country for media professionals in Africa in 2024.
The RSF has been directly implicated in the deaths of at least five journalists since the conflict erupted in April 2023, cementing its reputation for targeting members of the press and media workers.
The IFJ’s call for justice comes amid growing international scrutiny of the RSF and the deteriorating safety of journalists in Sudan with the country mired in a conflict fueled by a power struggle between rival generals.
Iran lifts ban on WhatsApp and Google Play, state media says
- Most of US-based social media remain blocked
DUBAI: Iranian authorities have lifted a ban on Meta’s instant messaging platform WhatsApp and Google Play as a first step to scale back Internet restrictions, Iranian state media reported on Tuesday.
The Islamic Republic has some of the strictest controls on Internet access in the world, but its blocks on US-based social media such as Facebook, Twitter and YouTube are routinely bypassed by tech-savvy Iranians using virtual private networks.
“A positive majority vote has been reached to lift limitations on access to some popular foreign platforms such as WhatsApp and Google Play,” Iran’s official IRNA news agency said on Tuesday, referring to a meeting on the matter headed by President Masoud Pezeshkian.
“Today the first step in removing Internet limitations... has been taken,” IRNA cited Iran’s Minister of Information and Communications Technology Sattar Hashemi as saying.
Social media platforms were widely used in anti-government protests in Iran.
In September the United States called on Big Tech to help evade online censorship in countries that heavily sensor the Internet, including Iran.
