It’s not illegal for a private citizen to say the name.
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The deeper you dig on this, the more amazing this story gets. Now we have another oligarch, Kolomoisky, alleged to have ordered hits on Fruman and Parnas, a sort of pest control. What is clear is that there are a lot of moving parts. Kolomoisky makes money in, you guessed it, natural gas. And with the Gazprom transit contract expiring in 2020, the stakes are rising and things are getting litigious (in London arbitration court usually, but Stockholm here).
There are some reasons for the conflict with Ukrainian oligarch Igor Kolomoisky, who is a minority shareholder in Ukrnafta (part of Naftogaz). In particular, Naftogaz and minority shareholders disputed Ukrnafta’s corporate governance issues (on the distribution of powers to appoint supervisory board members) in the London Arbitration. For several years now, disputes in relation to the disputed 10 billion cubic meters of gas have been considering in the Stockholm arbitration and in the Ukrainian courts. Ukrnafta (its minority shareholders) are demanding monetary compensation in accordance with the market price of gas. March 28, Naftogaz has announced the replacement of Mark Rollins, the head of the board of Ukrnafta company, often accused of acting in the interests of oligarch Kolomoisky.
As also noted in the same article, the fate of Nord Stream 2, the twin pipeline that will add another 55 billion cubic meters to Gazprom’s northern pipeline transmission into the EU, remains in the air. Gazprom has just gotten clearance for the final Danish leg, but a block in the courts on a suit brought by Poland now only gives Gazprom access to 50% of the capacity of the German OPAL trunk pipeline which it used to pump the gas south to western European markets and avoid Poland and Ukraine (which Gazprom likes). As an immediate consequence, Gazprom has to go back to Ukraine to bring the gas in through the Polish border, a minimum of, ahem, cough, cough, 10 billion cubic meters. Remember Trump’s blathering about sanctions Nord Stream 2 in June? I think all these little shits are in on the natural gas play, where the real money is, i.e. the Money River of Mr. Rosewater is really the Natural Gas river in this case. I"m still trying to figure out where Rick Perry and the LNG from Texas and Louisiana fit in to all this. As the wiki notes, " Before the Watergate scandal, Teapot Dome was regarded as the “greatest and most sensational scandal in the history of American politics”.[1]."
Given that we are talking about reshaping natural gas markets and energy geopolitics, something Enron’s scallawags only dreamed of, this should leave Teapot and Watergate in the dust.
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Ok, that’s fine - who are his sponsors, as a conservative radio host? Who’s broadcasting him? Let the boycotts begin and make it very clear to those sponsors that they are sanctioning someone who would endanger the life of someone who saw wrong and tried to right it.
I bet the guy is internet only, but I can sure try.
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I will come in 3rd and agree as well. Sent Josh Marshall a note on this point.
Not only does Josh K., have the background and contacts, but he’s an excellent investigative reporter. Brilliant hire by TPM and continued great reporting by Josh K.
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usually an exclusive is a story of some significance, though. Just don’t see why this is the headline today.
Hell, and quite possibly someone who had nothing to do with it, to boot. I read the realclearinvestigations article, they basically took someone who matched a couple of details from the NYT article and added a lot of speculation.
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It’s significant in that it’s filling in a gap. Lots of suspicion that they may well have been planning to hop on from Vienna to Ukraine, but nothing in hand. Now we have that, and details of just what they were going to be up to over there.
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Office of Legal Policy hunh, would that policy be “Protect Trump At All Costs”?
And just an observation, at what age do men get their “widow’s hump”?
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I was sure that he would not testify and help Democrats with a strong case because he’s too partisan. Now I’m back on the fence.
I’m sure he is try to thread some needle, just haven’t got a clue to what that needle is yet.
I’m thinking it may be possible there will be more to come on Biden, manufactured or not. Who knows? With what Axlerod said yesterday concerning Bloomberg not having confidence in Biden’s campaign durability, I’m just wondering if another shoe is going to drop concerning Biden. Although Bloomberg has not committed to anything yet, he’s telling close associates that he’s going to run.
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This is not about Kolomoisky, that is a red-herring story to deflect the REAL person they were on their way to meet: Dmytro Firtash.
Firtash appears in ALL of the stories about Ukraine, going back to 2013.
He is Putin’s hand-picked “man” in Ukraine, given the no-work-job of “middleman” in ALL the Ukrainian Natural Gas purchases from Russia, to the tune of $100s of millions in commissions, much of which I’m sure made it’s way back to Putin’s secret off-shore accounts via kickbacks. NOTHING happens financially in Russia without Putin getting a “taste” of the action. That is why he is purported to be worth well north of $20 Billion and growing, and why Trump grovels at his feet so (he would LOVE to be that powerful and wealthy and sees in Putin his Alpha-Dog.)
Firtash has been trying to PURCHASE dismissal of the corruption charges against him for years now, and that is why he lives in Vienna, fighting extradition to the US for trial. He has lots of sycophants in Kiev that work for him (and Putin) and has been cultivating US contacts to that end for years: Guilliani, and the Lawyers for Beavis and Butthead all are currently, or have previously worked for Firtash on this issue.
I am waiting for the US Media to finally start talking about this. Firtash offered (via Guilliani) to Trump to dig up dirt on Biden and used his contacts in Ukraine to try to make it happen in return for the charges being dropped against him (which is where Bill Barr comes into the picture.)
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How did these guys get US citizenship? Given their looks its clearly not the same way Melanoma got hers.
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Mike Pence ???
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If the only reason any of us should exhibit some self-restraint is because something is illegal (disregarding whether it is moral or scrupulous or even dangerous to someone) then we’ve already lost it all.
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Do it, Donnie! The optics will be great.
Epstein in the cell(ar) with a rope.
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Oh, no disagreement. That was just in response to a comment about legal beagles paying him a visit. Won’t be happening.
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And the dotard gets brownie points from Vlad and maybe a fresh line of credit to build hotels.
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Pence in Warsaw.
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Kamala can be the next AG and the Court Jester too!
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Bolton Knows About ‘Many Relevant Meetings’ on Ukraine, Lawyer Says
And you can read about them in his new book rushing to bookstore shelves by Christmas.
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