ups

[Wolfgang Bauer]

Servus.

wo sind sie?

[orson]

reese


https://news.yahoo.com/pompeo-confronted-fox-news-legitimising-204957342.html

Pic of Mike Pompeo meeting with Taliban leader comes back to haunt him
as he critiques Biden on Afghanistan

Mr Wallace responded, however, by pointing out that Mr Pompeo himself
had pushed to legitimise the Taliban’s leadership under the Trump
administration, which eventually inked a ceasefire deal that largely resulted
in the Taliban shifting their military attacks to target local security
forces
and the Afghan National Army.

"Do you regret giving the Taliban that legitimacy? Do you regret pressing
the Afghan government to release 5,000 prisoners, which they did, some
of whom are now back on the battlefield fighting with the Taliban?" asked
Mr Wallace.



https://apnews.com/article/asia-pacific-islamic-state-group-taliban-politics-afghanistan-01ac38c793ca71a2ec099c226e50e7c8

October 8, 2020

The U.S. military was blindsided Thursday by President Donald Trump’s
assertion that all U.S. troops will be out of Afghanistan by the end of the
year, with U.S. officials saying they are not aware of such a plan and have
gotten no actual order to accelerate the more gradual pullout they’ve been
executing.

Trump’s comments, laid out in a confusing progression of comments and
a tweet, alarmed Pentagon and State officials who fear that putting a
definitive date on troop withdrawal could undercut negotiations to finalize
a peace deal between the Taliban and the Afghan government. They also
fear a hasty withdrawal could force the U.S. to leave behind sensitive
military equipment. And they continue to stress that the Taliban has still
not met requirements to reduce violence against the Afghans, a key
element of the U.S. withdrawal plan.

The Taliban welcomed Trump’s announcements ...



https://www.nytimes.com/2020/08/09/world/asia/afghanistan-taliban-prisoners-peace-talks.html

President Ashraf Ghani of Afghanistan on Sunday said his government would
release a last batch of Taliban prisoners, removing the final hurdle in
the way of direct negotiations with the insurgents to end the country’s
long war.

His announcement came after a consultative assembly where he had been
advised by thousands of representatives from across the country.

The release of 5,000 Taliban prisoners, which the United States agreed to
in a February deal with the insurgents that also began the phased
withdrawal of American troops, faced opposition from the Afghan
government, which is holding the prisoners. After prolonged pressure from
the Trump administration, Mr. Ghani released 4,600 prisoners from a list
provided by the Taliban but called for consultations over 400, who he said
were accused or convicted of major crimes, including murder, that were
beyond his authority to pardon.


https://www.reuters.com/article/us-health-coronavirus-afghanistan-taliba/taliban-step-up-attacks-on-afghan-forces-since-signing-u-s-deal-data-idUSKBN22D5S7
MAY 1, 2020

The Taliban have mounted more than 4,500 attacks in Afghanistan, marking a
sharp
escalation in violence, in the 45 days since signing a deal with the
United States that
paves the way for a U.S. troop drawdown, according to data seen by Reuters.



https://www.cbsnews.com/news/taliban-on-trump-we-hope-he-will-win-the-election-withdraw-us-troops/

President Trump's reelection bid received a vote of support Friday from an
entity most in his party would reject: the Taliban.

Taliban spokesman Zabihullah Mujahid told CBS News in a phone interview,
"We believe that Trump is going to win the upcoming election because he
has proved himself a politician who accomplished all the major promises he
had made to American people, although he might have missed some small
things, but did accomplish the bigger promises, so it is possible that the
U.S. people who experienced deceptions in the past will once again trust
Trump for his decisive actions."

Another senior Taliban leader told CBS News, "We hope he will win the
election and wind up U.S. military presence in Afghanistan."

[wobynite]

reese oreese russia



https://www.snopes.com/fact-check/hillary-clinton-uranium-russia-deal/


http://www.businessinsider.com/fox-news-shep-smith-hillary-clinton-scandal-the-uranium-one-deal-2017-11

and

https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/americas/shepard-smith-fox-news-hilary-clinton-uranium-scandal-debunk-viewers-demand-firing-reporter-donald-a8060281.html



http://thehill.com/homenews/administration/402062-fox-news-host-hits-giuliani-dossier-isnt-why-mueller-probe-was
08/15/18
Fox News host hits Giuliani: Dossier isn't why Mueller probe was started




https://www.rferl.org/a/why-was-ukraine-top-prosecutor-fired-viktor-shokin/30181445.html

Trump and his allies, including his personal lawyer, Rudolph Giuliani, the
former mayor of New York, accuse Biden of using his position as vice
president and point man on relations with Kyiv in 2016 to help Burisma --
a Ukrainian energy company that was paying Biden's son Hunter, who was on
its board of directors -- avoid damage from a criminal investigation.

They assert that Shokin was overseeing an active criminal investigation
into Burisma and that Biden at the time told Ukrainian President Petro
Poroshenko that the United States would withhold $1 billion in loan
guarantees unless Shokin was fired.

But Ukrainian prosecutors and anti-corruption activists with knowledge of
the matter argue that the timeline of developments in the Burisma case and
Shokin's stint as chief prosecutor simply does not fit the narrative being
put forward by Trump and his allies.

Moreover, they say that Shokin himself was the biggest obstacle standing
in the way of the investigation.


https://www.nytimes.com/2019/10/23/us/politics/ukraine-aid-freeze-impeachment.html
Ukraine Knew of Aid Freeze by Early August

To Democrats who say that President Trump’s decision to
freeze $391 million in military aid was intended to bully Ukraine’s leader
into carrying out investigations for Mr. Trump’s political benefit, the
president and his allies have had a simple response: There was no quid pro
quo because the Ukrainians did not know assistance had been blocked.

But then on Tuesday, William B. Taylor Jr., the top United States diplomat
in Kiev, told House impeachment investigators that the freeze was directly
linked to Mr. Trump’s demand. That did not deter the president, who on
Wednesday approvingly tweeted a quote by a congressional Republican saying
neither Mr. Taylor nor any other witness had “provided testimony that the
Ukrainians were aware that military aid was being withheld.”

In fact, word of the aid freeze had gotten to high-level Ukrainian
officials by the first week in August, according to interviews and
documents obtained by The New York Times.



https://www.wsj.com/articles/bidens-anticorruption-effort-in-ukraine-overlapped-with-sons-work-in-country-11569189782
Biden led anticorruption efforts in Ukraine

Joe Biden's involvement with Ukraine and his son's work in the country,
which President Trump has repeatedly said should be investigated, began
when the former vice president was serving as the Obama administration's
point man on relations with Ukraine and rooting out bureaucratic corruption.

Soon after Moscow invaded the country in 2014 and annexed its peninsula of
Crimea, Mr. Biden took a lead role in U.S. efforts to support the fragile
government in Kiev. He shuttled back and forth to the Ukrainian capital,
coordinating U.S. aid packages and cajoling the officials to enact reforms
even as the country fought off Russian-backed rebels in the country's east.

Mr. Biden had called for the ouster of Mr. Shokin because he and others
thought that the prosecutor wasn't aggressive enough.



https://www.businessinsider.com/sean-patrick-maloney-gets-sondland-say-investigations-would-benefit-trump-2019-11
Rep Maloney gets Sondland to admit Ukrane investigations would benefit
Trump - and gets applause

Maloney asked Sondland about who would benefit from the Ukrainian probe
three times before the ambassador gave an answer.

"I assume President Trump would benefit," Sondland finally said.

"There we go," Maloney said as the crowd broke into applause. "There we
have it. See? Didn't hurt a bit, did it?"



https://www.reuters.com/article/us-usa-trump-impeachment-cooper/ukraine-officials-knew-about-hold-on-aid-earlier-than-reported-idUSKBN1XU2VX

A senior U.S. Department of Defense official testified on Wednesday that
Ukrainian officials knew President Donald Trump’s administration was
withholding military assistance in July, undercutting a key Republican
defense of the president’s actions in the impeachment inquiry.

Deputy Assistant Secretary of Defense Laura Cooper testified at a hearing
in the impeachment inquiry into Trump that has largely focused on the
decision to withhold nearly $400 million in security aid.

She said Ukrainian officials had known in July about the holdup in the
security aid, which was new information she had not had when she was
interviewed behind closed doors on Oct. 23.

Cooper said her staff received an email on July 25 from the State
Department saying that Ukraine’s embassy and the U.S. House of
Representatives Foreign Affairs Committee were asking about security
assistance.

“On July 25 a member of my staff got a question from a Ukrainian Embassy
contact asking what was going on with U.S. security assistance,” Cooper
told the House Intelligence Committee at the impeachment hearing.

July 25 was the day of a telephone call between Trump and Ukrainian
President Volodymyr Zelenskiy in which the Republican U.S. president
raised the issues of an investigation of Democratic former Vice President
Joe Biden, alleged Ukrainian interference in the 2016 presidential
election and the aid.



Docs reveal White House ordered Pentagon to freeze Ukraine’s help 90
minutes after Trump’s call to Zelensky
https://themediahq.com/the-white-house-ordered-the-pentagon-to-freeze-ukraines-help-90-minutes-after-trumps-call-to-zelensky-documents-reveal/

The Donald Trump administration ordered the Pentagon to freeze $ 391
million (£ 300 million) of military aid to Ukraine less than two hours
after the phone call in which the president of the United States asked the
Ukrainian leader Volodymyr Zelensky to investigate his political rival Joe
Biden revealed recently published internal emails. .

A declassified White House memo that documents the president’s call on
July 25 with Zelensky shows that the call, during which Trump asked his
Ukrainian counterpart to investigate a conspiracy theory that his own
assistants attributed to intelligence services from Russia, started at
9.03 am and finished 30 minutes later. .

At 11.04 in the morning of that day, 91 minutes after the end of the call,
Michael Duffey, senior official of the Office of Administration and Budget
(OMB), sent an email to the Department of Defense officials requesting
that the Pentagon Stop making plans to distribute security assistance
funds to Ukraine, according to newspapers. show.

The White House’s decision to withhold funds, a measure that legal experts
say violated US law that prohibits the president from “confiscating” funds
allocated by Congress, is at the center of charges of “abuse of power.
“for which the House of Representatives accused Trump of Wednesday.