Tag: news

The Department of Justice will interview senior CIA personnel as part of a sweeping investigation into the origins of ‘Russiagate,’ according to the New York Times, citing anonymous sources briefed on the matter. 

The interview plans are the latest sign the Justice Department will take a critical look at the C.I.A.’s work on Russia’s election interference. Investigators want to talk with at least one senior counterintelligence official and a senior C.I.A. analyst, the people said. Both officials were involved in the agency’s work on understanding the Russian campaign to sabotage the election in 2016. –New York Times

The Times notes that while the DOJ probe is not a criminal inquiry, CIA employees are nervous, according to former officials, while senior agency officials have questioned why the CIA’s analytical work should be within the purview of John H. Durham – the US Attorney for Connecticut appointed by Attorney General William Barr to oversee the review. 

Justice Department officials have given only broad clues about the review but did note that it is focused on the period leading up to the 2016 vote. Mr. Barr has been interested in how the C.I.A. drew its conclusions about Russia’s election sabotage, particularly the judgment that Mr. Putin ordered that operatives help Mr. Trump by discrediting his opponent, Hillary Clinton, according to current and former American officials. 

Mr. Barr wants to know more about the C.I.A. sources who helped inform its understanding of the details of the Russian interference campaign, an official has said. He also wants to better understand the intelligence that flowed from the C.I.A. to the F.B.I. in the summer of 2016. –New York Times

And why should the CIA be nervous? Fox News commentator Monica Crowley laid it out in an April Op-Ed in the Washington Times: 

The Obama Department of Justice and FBI targeting of two low-level Trump aides, George Papadopoulos and Carter Page, was carried out in the spring of 2016 because they wanted to spy on the Trump campaign but needed a way in. They enlisted an American academic and shadowy FBI informant named Stefan Halper to repeatedly sidle up to both Mr. Papadopoulos and Mr. Page. But complementing his work for the FBI, Mr. Halper had a side gig as an intelligence operative with longstanding ties to the CIA and British intelligence MI6.

Another foreign professor, Joseph Mifsud, who played an important early part in targeting Papadopoulos, also had abiding ties to the CIA, MI6 and the British foreign secretary.

A third operative, Australian diplomat Alexander Downer, targeted Mr. Papadopoulos in a London bar. It was Mr. Downer’s “tip” to the FBI that provided the justification for the start of Russia counterintelligence investigation, complete with fraudulently-obtained FISA warrants to spy on the Trump campaign.

All of these interactions reek of entrapment. Mr. Papadopoulos now says, “I believe Australian and UK intelligence were involved in an active operation to target Trump and his associates.” Like Mr. Halper and Mr. Mifsud, Mr. Downer had ties to the CIA, MI6 and (surprise!) the Clintons.

Given the deep intelligence backgrounds of these folks, it’s difficult to believe that former DOJ/FBI officials such as Peter Strzok or even James Comey and Andrew McCabe on their own devised the plan to deploy them.

***

It should also be noted that Papadopoulos has suggested Stefan Halper’s fake assistant ‘Azra Turk’ is CIA, not FBI as widely reported, and that what happened to him “was clearly a CIA operation.“

According to the Times, CIA director Gina Haspel has told senior officials that the agency will cooperate – up to a point, as “critical pieces of intelligence whose disclosure could jeopardize sources, reveal collection methods or disclose information provided by allies” will not be shared. 

Interestingly, Haspel was the CIA’s station chief in London during the Russiagate investigation – where the majority of the espionage against the Trump campaign aides took place. 

The Justice Department has not submitted formal written requests to talk to the C.I.A. officers, but law enforcement officials have told intelligence officials that Mr. Durham will seek the interviews, two of the people said. Communications officers for both the C.I.A. and the Justice Department declined to comment.

One of the CIA officers Durham wants to question works at the agency’s counterintelligence mission center – one potential conduit between the CIA and the FBI through which the agencies might have passed information during the Trump-Russia investigation. Another senior analyst Durham wants to talk to was involved in the CIA’s assessment of Russian interference in the 2016 election. 

The ties between the efforts by the C.I.A. and the F.B.I. to examine Russia’s election interference are broader. In the summer of 2016, the intelligence community formed a task force housed at the C.I.A. to investigate Russian interference. The group shared intelligence with F.B.I. investigators who opened the bureau’s Russia inquiry in an effort to determine whether any Americans were working with the Russians on their interference during the election. –New York Times

Of note – the CIA focuses on foreign intelligence and is not supposed to investigate Americans. Instead, the agency is required to pass domestic issues which arise during investigations to the FBI. 

via ZeroHedge News http://bit.ly/2IDEtK0 Tyler Durden

Yesterday while reading the morning audio comment from UBS’ top economist Paul Donovan, one section was dedicated to China’s latest inflation print, which struck us as a tad bizarre even for the famously whimsical, humorous and sarcastic Donovan, and we promptly tweeted it:

“Chinese consumer prices rose. This was mainly due to sick pigs. Does this matter? It matters if you are a Chinese pig” – UBS

— zerohedge (@zerohedge) June 12, 2019

For those curious, the full comment was the following:

Chinese consumer prices rose. This was mainly due to sick pigs. Does this matter? It matters if you are a Chinese pig. It matters if you like eating pork in China. It does not really matter to the rest of the world. China does not export a lot of food. The only global relevance would be if Chinese inflation influenced politics and other policies.

To be sure, we didn’t find Donovan’s comment offensive, racist or excessive in any way – and was generally representative of his caustic and dry wit – yet someone else did. In fact, quite a few humorless someone elses.

Shortly after we tweeted UBS’ snide take on China’s inflation, our tweet made its way all the way into the mainland, where it caused quite a stir, and resulted in a furious backlash against the largest Swiss bank. Here is what China’s notoriously globalist tabloid said on Thursday morning:

UBS chief global economist Paul Donovan used distasteful and racist language to analyze China’s inflation in a recent UBS report, sparking uproar across Chinese social media. Chinese netizens called for an official apology from #UBS.

#BREAKING UBS chief global economist Paul Donovan used distasteful and racist language to analyze China’s inflation in a recent UBS report, sparking uproar across Chinese social media. Chinese netizens called for an official apology from #UBS. pic.twitter.com/uTMR6wyj02

— Global Times (@globaltimesnews) June 13, 2019

This unexpected international escalation over what was an attempt at humor, prompted the Zurich-based bank to issue a formal apology, saying the remarks in Paul Donovan’s Morning Audio Comment, were “innocently intended”, and that Donovan was speaking in reference to the rise in Chinese consumer prices that were mainly due to sick pigs. “Does this matter?” he said. “It matters if you are a Chinese pig. It matters if you like eating pork in China.”

Donovan echoed this in his Thursday Morning Audio Comment, where he said “First, an apology to my China listeners about yesterday’s podcast about inflation in China. I apologize unreservedly for any misunderstanding caused by my innocently intended comments. We have removed the audio comment from circulation. To be clear, this comment was about inflation and Chinese consumer prices rising, which was driven by 14.4% year-on-year higher prices for pork.”

Shortly thereafter, to avoid any further complications, Donovan also appeared on Bloomberg TV, where he doubled down saying “I made a mistake and I unwittingly used hugely culturally-insensitive language,” in a Bloomberg TV interview with Francine Lacqua, adding that his remarks were not intended to offend. “I apologize publicly for that.”

But it was too late, as by then Donovan’s remarks had sparked outrage on social media sites in China, with users saying the comment humiliated Chinese people. At least three public accounts published articles about the report on WeChat, drawing more than 10,000 hits. Screen grabs of the report also circulated on chat groups. Some users posted a link to a UBS web page for filing complaints.

As the Global Times added in a subsequent report, “Chinese netizens were outraged on Thursday by a UBS report that used distasteful and racist language to analyze China’s inflation and called for putting the Swiss bank on the Chinese Unreliable Entity List despite an apology for what it calls its “innocently intended comment“.”

And now we know what triggers China’s “Unreliable Entity List” – jokes about inflation and pigs which apparently results in 1.4 billion Chinese going full Hulk.

As the tabloid newspaper adds “some considered the UBS apology and the analyst involved not sincere, which they said reflects the deep arrogance of Western elites to Chinese culture.” Well that, or it reflect the fact that the Chinese culture is missing a sense of humor. Case in point: “The report sparked outrage among Chinese netizens and some economists on China’s Weibo and Twitter.”

“Hey, UBS, I think it’s time for you to get out of China,” a Twitter user surnamed Zhang said, echoed by another Twitter user laughing at the Swiss investment bank and its analyst who shot himself in the foot with his pun.

It gets better:

The UBS report was widely circulated on Chinese social media on Thursday morning, and many strongly condemned it and asked for an official apology from the company. Later in the afternoon, UBS sent out a brief statement, calling it an “innocently intended comment.”

“We apologize unreservedly for any misunderstanding caused by these innocently intended comments by Paul Donovan. We have removed the audio comment from circulation,” UBS told the Global Times on Thursday, noting that to be clear, this comment was about inflation and rising Chinese consumer prices, which was driven by the higher prices for pork.

UBS takes this matter seriously. We are enhancing our internal processes to avoid any recurrence of a similar situation. We remain fully committed to investing in China, the company statement said.

Chinese netizens did not buy his apology. “Normally, white elites do not have regard for other races, and Westerners usually call Chinese people Chinese pigs,” a netizen using the pseudonym Xifan said on Weibo. Another one who goes by Tianzheyou said it is a pun, while other netizens think that the apology was unacceptable.

What can one say but… “what?”

As the Global Times subtweeted the Swiss bank, “UBS, the first fully licensed foreign-invested securities firm in China, became the first foreign bank to gain majority control of a securities joint venture in China in December 2018. The Switzerland-based bank was allowed by the China Securities Regulatory Commission (CSRC) to increase its shares in its securities joint venture in China from 24.99 percent to 51 percent.”

Unfortunately for UBS, that one innocent comment can soon cost the bank billions in Chinese lost revenue:

A netizen named Xiyoufodongyoudao suggested on Weibo that China should stop its cooperation with UBS and the firm should be put on China’s “Unreliable Entity List.”

As a reminder, China announced on May 31 that it would create an “Unreliable Entity List” of foreign companies and individuals that threaten the interests of Chinese companies. Or apparently, joke about the fact that China is unable to contain its “pig ebola.”

Not everyone lost their minds, luckily, and some netizens considered it as an unintended mistake, which might have been exaggerated. Alas, most did: a Beijing-based white collar employee surnamed Wang criticized the UBS apology, claiming it worsened the situation. “Not only did it not offer a sincere apology by saying that this was about consumer prices and higher pork prices, but also implied that Chinese people could not read English properly,” he said.

“The problem is not that people do not understand what the article is about; the problem is that they chose a phrase (Chinese pig) that has clear racist connotations,” he added. Actually, it doesn’t, and it shoes that Chinese people indeed can not read English properly when they are hell bent on creating an absolutely idiotic provocation, but whatever.

The incident also sparked uproar among some Chinese economists, who saw the UBS remarks as unprofessional and tone-deaf.

“As a professional financial analyst, he [Donovan] should have carefully chosen his words, and avoided being misunderstood,” Dong Shaopeng, a veteran analyst who advises the CSRC, told the Global Times on Thursday.

However, the UBS apology should be respected and taken into the account, he suggested, noting that China should not narrow-mindedly reject the foreign bank from participating in the country’s future financial market opening-up because of this incident.

“UBS still plays an important role in China’s financial reforms,” he said.

Whether UBS will soon be declared non-grata in China remains to be seen, but one thing is certain: any strategist or economist writing about China, whether it is about its expensive pigs, or the fact that its financial system hangs by a thread and the country is one uncontrolled bank run away from a social revolt, will twink twice before hitting save.

via ZeroHedge News http://bit.ly/31wn6mU Tyler Durden

Authored by Nick Cunningham via Oilprice.com

Trump backed off his proposed trade war with Mexico in the face of intense pressure from business groups and even his own party, but his faith in tariffs remains unbowed. In fact, Trump may have internalized a lesson that presents further risks to the global economy and to oil markets.

“If we didn’t have tariffs, we wouldn’t have made a deal with Mexico,” Trump said on Monday.

“We got everything we wanted.”

The proposed 5 percent tariff on Mexico was suspended because Trump said that the Mexican government agreed to a series of demands to tighten up migration through the country. However, press reports suggest that some of the provisions in the deal, such as Mexico agreeing to buy agricultural goods, are a mirage, while others, such as expanding border security, were agreed to months ago.

Leaving those pesky details aside, Trump was triumphant. Indeed, even though the White House saw pushback from business groups and the Republican-controlled U.S. Senate, in Trump’s mind the whole episode seems to have reaffirmed his strategy.

With the U.S.-China trade war unfinished, the U.S. President feels emboldened to take a hardline on Beijing.

“The China deal’s going to work out,” Trump said in an interview on CNBC.

“You know why? Because of tariffs. Because right now China is getting absolutely decimated by companies that are leaving China, going to other countries, including our own, because they don’t want to pay the tariffs.”

Moreover, he says that the tariffs to date have been successful.

“We’ve never gotten 10 cents from China. Now we’re getting a lot of money from China, and I think that’s one of the reasons the G.D.P. was so high in the first quarter because of the tariffs that we’re taking in from China,” he told reporters on Monday.

All evidence points to the contrary. Global growth concerns have ballooned since the hike in tariffs last month. Recently, finance ministers from G-20 recently met and said that risks from trade and geopolitical tensions were “intensifying.”

“The principal threat stems from continuing trade tensions,” IMF managing director Christine Lagarde said. “To mitigate these risks, I emphasized that the first priority should be to resolve the current trade tensions — including eliminating existing tariffs and avoiding new ones — while we need to continue to work toward the modernization of the international trade system.”

The IMF said that the U.S.-China trade war could shave off global GDP By 0.5 percent, or $455 billion, in 2020.

Meanwhile, Trump continues to browbeat the U.S. Federal Reserve into backing off interest rate hikes. While there is little evidence that the Fed has been influenced by the intense pressure, the central bank has in fact backed off more rate hikes and has even opened up the door to reversing course and cutting rates again. Trump may actually force the hand of Fed Chairman Jerome Powell. By engaging in a trade war with China, which a wide range of economists say would slow down global growth, Trump may create the conditions where a rate cut is needed. A loosening of monetary policy would likely then relieve some economic and political pressure on the White House as its pursues its trade war.

Last week, the U.S. Labor Department reported job increases of May of just 75,000, sharply below consensus estimates. A weak jobs report from May would typically sink financial markets, but equities rose on the news as investors viewed the downbeat assessment as increasing the odds of a rate cut from the Fed.

The next flashpoint could come as soon as this month. The U.S. Trade Representative is holding a hearing on June 17 to ask companies about the effects of the next round of tariffs on China – a 25 percent levy on $300 billion worth of imports. Trump said on Monday that he would move forward with the tariffs if Xi declined to meet with him in Japan at the end of June.

The first few waves of tariffs on Chinese goods hit select items. But levies on the remaining $300 billion would have a greater impact on the consumer economy, likely dragging down growth. That, in turn, would drag down crude oil demand at a time when demand was already softening. In May, crude oil posted its worst price slide since the financial crisis, in large part because of the jump in U.S. tariffs on China.

The EIA released its Short-Term Energy Outlook on Tuesday, which included downward revisions to both supply and demand. U.S. shale takes a hit this year because of lower prices, but prices will be lower because demand will be weaker than previously thought. The agency sees demand rising by 1.2 million barrels per day this year, down 200,000 bpd from its previous report.

[ZH: Considering an attack – false flag or not – on two tankers in the Straits of Hormuz prompted a mere $2 jump in oil prices, we suspect there is considerably more fear about global growth than about World War 3 for now]

via ZeroHedge News http://bit.ly/2RhpCsr Tyler Durden

Russian lawmakers have said the new US-Poland joint declaration unveiled yesterday, which will see 1,000 more US troops sent to Poland from Germany along with military drones, will force the Kremlin to take “retaliatory steps” against what the Russian parliamentary statement called US “further large-scale deployments”.

One lawmaker went so far as to say the Russian military “would make Poland a target in the event of a conflict,” according to Reuters.

Russia’s deputy foreign minister also warned of Washington’s “aggressive intentions” following Trump’s pledge to Polish President Andrzej Duda on Wednesday during a White House visit. 

One Russian official, identified as the deputy head of the upper house of parliament’s international affairs committee, told the Interfax news agency: “In the event of any conflict, God forbid, the territory of Poland would become a clear target for a retaliatory strike, if there was suddenly an attack on us,” as cited in Reuters, while others warned of a new Cuban missile crisis scenario but this time on Russia’s border. 

Per the Reuters report, one top parliamentary official went so far as to invoke a nuclear scenario: 

Another lawmaker, ex-commander of Russia’s special forces Vladimir Shamanov, who now runs the lower house of parliament’s defense committee, said he was concerned about the U.S. drones because of their potential to carry nuclear weapons.

“The world is gradually slipping toward a dangerous moment comparable to the Caribbean crisis,” Shamanov said, using the Russian expression for the 1962 Cuban Missile Crisis – a standoff between the United States and the Soviet Union that brought the world to the brink of nuclear war.

“…We will be forced to take retaliatory measures and we have them in our armory,” Interfax cited him as saying.

Meanwhile Russian military statements indicate the Kremlin is watching this new US deployment in Poland closely, to “ensure” no actions could threaten Russian security.

Though parliament has no foreign policy decision-making authority, the explosive public reactions certainly serve as a broad reflection of the defense establishment’s growing anger and willingness to lash out while helplessly watching continued US military commitment and build-up in Eastern Europe, recently including nations like Romania as well. 

Trump’s comments to the press while hosting President Duda on Wednesday suggested a continued growing US commitment right on Russia’s doorstep. He said, “They get hurt, unfortunately, too often, right? Too often,” while speaking of Poland. “They are in the middle of everything. When bad things happen, it seems Poland is the first one that is in there and it is unfortunate.”

via ZeroHedge News http://bit.ly/2ZlKKR3 Tyler Durden

In yet another blow for the government-sponsored carmaker and solar-panel-seller, Reuters reports that the US Trade Rep’s office has denied Tesla’s request for tariff relief on the Model 3′ Chinese-made ‘brain’.

Reuters reports that Musk had warned that increased tariffs on the car computer it dubbed the “brains” of the Model 3 causes economic harm to Tesla, through the increase of costs and impact to profitability

The U.S. Trade Representative’s Office denied both requests in May 29 letters, saying they both concern “a product strategically important or related to ’Made in China 2025 or other Chinese industrial programs.”

TSLA shares – having erased all of the Musk Show gains – is sliding from earlier gains…

Tesla faces a 25% tariff on its Chinese-made car computer and center screen, according to letters seen by Reuters.

via ZeroHedge News http://bit.ly/2MW6HES Tyler Durden