U.S. prosecutors name Trump in hush payments, detail Russian contacts

Agencies
December 8, 2018

Washington, Dec 8: U.S. prosecutors said on Friday President Donald Trump directed his personal lawyer to make illegal hush payments to two women ahead of the 2016 election, and also detailed a previously unknown attempt by a Russian to help the Trump campaign.

In court filings, federal prosecutors in New York and those working for Special Counsel Robert Mueller made the case for why Trump's former personal lawyer, Michael Cohen, and his former campaign chairman, Paul Manafort, deserved prison time.

The documents turned up the heat on Trump by confirming prosecutors' belief of his involvement in a campaign finance violation, while adding to a growing list of contacts between campaign aides and Russians in 2015 and 2016, legal experts said.

"In total, the prosecutors seem to be saying the president was more aware than he has claimed to be," former federal prosecutor Michael Zeldin said.

Prosecutors in both of the Cohen cases were required to submit separate memos on Friday on his cooperation to U.S. District Judge William Pauley in Manhattan, who will decide on the former lawyer's sentence on Dec. 12.

While Cohen implicated the president in the hush payments to two women -- adult film actress Stormy Daniels and former Playboy model Karen McDougal -- in his guilty plea in August in New York, the filing on Friday marked the first time federal prosecutors officially concurred.

It said Cohen made the payments in "coordination with and the direction of" Trump.

Democrats jumped on that assertion and called for steps to protect Mueller's probe into possible collusion between Russia and Trump's presidential campaign.

"These legal documents outline serious and criminal wrongdoing, including felony violations of campaign finance laws at the direction of President Trump," Senator Diane Feinstein said in a statement.

The president has denied any collusion with Russia, and accuses Mueller's prosecutors of pressuring his former aides to lie about him, his campaign and his business dealings. Russia has denied interfering in the election to help Trump.

In new tweets on Friday, Trump accused federal investigators and senior officials of having conflicts of interest, without offering evidence. White House spokeswoman Sarah Sanders called Cohen a liar and dismissed the filings as insignificant.

"The government's filings in Mr. Cohen's case tell us nothing of value that wasn’t already known," Sanders said.

Russian Contacts

Last week, Cohen admitted to lying to congressional investigators in an attempt to minimize his efforts to secure the Kremlin's help for a Trump skyscraper in Moscow. He has said he did so to stay in sync with Trump's political messaging, and that he consulted with the White House while preparing to testify to Congress.

Mueller said on Friday that Cohen repeated his false statements about the project in his first meeting with Mueller's office, admitting the truth only in a later meeting in September after he had pleaded guilty to the separate New York charges.

On Friday, Mueller said Cohen's false statements to Congress had "obscured the fact" that the skyscraper project held the potential to reap "hundreds of millions of dollars from Russian sources" for the Trump Organization.

Mueller said that discussions about the potential Moscow development were relevant to the investigation because they occurred "at a time of sustained efforts by the Russian government to interfere with the U.S. presidential election."

In addition to coming clean on the Moscow project, Cohen provided information to Mueller about several attempts by Russians to contact the Trump's campaign, according to Friday's filing.

In November 2015, Cohen spoke with a Russian national who said he could offer the campaign "political synergy" with Russia and repeatedly proposed a meeting with Putin. Cohen did not follow up on the offer, the filing says.

Mueller also said in the filing that Cohen had provided "relevant and useful information concerning his contacts with persons connected to the White House" in 2017 and 2018.

Mueller also detailed alleged lies told by Manafort during interviews with prosecutors and the FBI. Last month Mueller voided Manafort's plea agreement because, they said, he was not telling the truth.

They said Manafort told "multiple discernible lies," including about his communications with a political consultant will alleged ties to Russian intelligence, and about interactions with Trump administration officials even after Manafort was first indicted in late 2017.

Pushing For Time

The filings followed a sentencing memo earlier this week regarding Trump's former national security adviser, Michael Flynn, who Mueller praised for providing "substantial" cooperation and argued for no prison time.

Cohen had been hoping prosecutors would make a similar recommendation in his case. But the New York prosecutors were unsparing in their descriptions of his conduct, saying he was motivated by "personal greed" and that he "repeatedly used his power and influence for deceptive ends."

They said Cohen should receive some credit for cooperating with Mueller but noted he had not entered into a similar agreement with their office. They said his sentence should reflect a "modest" reduction from the four to five years they said federal guidelines would suggest.

Mueller, for his part, praised Cohen for voluntarily providing information about his own and others' conduct on "core topics under investigation" and described the information as "credible and consistent with other evidence" they had obtained.

Considering that cooperation, Mueller suggested the sentence for lying to Congress run concurrently with the sentence in the New York case.

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coastaldigest.com news network
November 5,2024

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Several videos have been circulating across social media platforms, claiming that football superstar Cristiano Ronaldo is shown reading the Quran in a mosque. Several posts have gone further to claim that Ronaldo and his wife have converted to Islam. The videos have attracted millions of views and sparked widespread speculation. 

Is Ronaldo Reciting the Quran?

One such video shows a man reading from the Quran, with captions like "Cristiano Ronaldo Reciting Quran." Several posts, especially on TikTok and Facebook, claim that Ronaldo has not only read the Quran but has also embraced Islam along with his wife, Georgina Rodríguez. One of these TikTok posts amassed 1.7 million likes and over 58,000 shares, adding to the viral momentum of this claim.

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Ronaldo Lookalike from Iraq

Contrary to these claims, the man in the video is not Cristiano Ronaldo. The individual is Bewar Abdullah, a well-known Ronaldo lookalike originally from Iraq, who now resides in Birmingham, U.K. Abdullah has gained fame for his striking resemblance to Ronaldo and regularly posts content online imitating the footballer.

The Reality

The viral video was initially posted by Bewar Abdullah on his TikTok account (@bewarabdullah) on July 20, 2021, with the caption "Eat Mubarek🕌 (sic)." Abdullah has a large following of 1.7 million people.

Abdullah is frequently mistaken for Ronaldo due to his resemblance, and his name appears at the end of the viral video, confirming his identity.

Abdullah’s online popularity stems from his likeness to Ronaldo, and he regularly receives invitations to events and appearances due to this.

Apart from the video, there are also widespread claims that Ronaldo and his wife have converted to Islam. However, there is no credible evidence to support this. These rumors appear to have emerged from the same viral content surrounding Ronaldo’s lookalike, without any basis in fact.

Why the Confusion?

The confusion arises from Abdullah’s close resemblance to Ronaldo and the viral nature of social media posts that often mislead viewers. The presence of Ronaldo-related hashtags and captions like "#Ronaldo #CristianoRonaldo #CR7 #SaudiArabia" further fueled the speculation, making it seem more believable to the football star's global fanbase.

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News Network
November 7,2024

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Mangaluru, Nov 7: In the quiet village of Tippunagar, Loretto Padavu, a heartbreaking accident claimed the life of three-year-old Aashika on Wednesday, leaving a family and community shattered.

Aashika, the beloved daughter of Unais from Pattanabailu near Farangipet, was simply enjoying a carefree moment, playing outside her grandmother’s house. It was then that an unimaginable tragedy struck: a parked goods tempo, owned by her uncle, unexpectedly rolled backward, trapping the innocent child beneath its wheels.

Despite her family’s desperate rush to get her to the hospital, little Aashika’s injuries proved too severe, and she was declared dead upon arrival. Her passing has cast a deep shadow over the close-knit community, who grieve alongside her family for the life taken too soon.

The Bantwal traffic police have registered a case and are investigating the incident, while the community mourns the loss of a precious young soul who had only just begun to experience life’s wonder.
 

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News Network
November 11,2024

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The Manipur Kuki MLAs have released a statement calling out Solicitor General Tushar Mehta's 'lies' in the Supreme Court. In a joint statement, the MLAs, including those from the Bharatiya Janata Party, said they had not had any meeting with the Chief Minister since May 3, 2023, nor did they intend to meet him in the future as “he was the mastermind behind the violence”.

As per the MLAs, the SG lied about state CM N Biren Singh speaking to Kuki MLAs to control the situation there, in order to halt a Supreme Court probe into the leaked tapes which allege that Singh has been complicit in the violence that broke out between Kukis and Meitis there.

"We...clarify that we have never had any meeting with Chief Minister, Shri N. Biren Singh since May 3, 2023, nor have any intention to meet him in future as he is the mastermind behind the violence and ethnic cleansing of our people from the Imphal valley, which is continuing till today, the latest being the brutal killing and burning of Mrs Zosangkim Hmar on November 7, 2024," the letter read, while condemning the recent 'barbaric' killing of the woman there, and noting the SG's assertion is 'tantamount' to misleading the top court.

“We, the undersigned ten MLAs, have come to know that during the Supreme Court hearing held on November 8, 2024, the Solicitor General of India submitted that ‘CM is meeting all Kuki MLAs and trying to bring the situation down to get peace’. In this connection, we hereby categorically state that this submission is a blatant lie and tantamount to misleading the Hon’ble Supreme Court of India,” the statement said.

The Supreme Court, while hearing a petition by a Kuki organisation, asked that it submit audio tapes to substantiate its claim that the Chief Minister was instrumental in inciting and organising violence in the northeastern State.

Solicitor-General Tushar Mehta orally informed the court that the Chief Minister was meeting all the Kuki-Zo MLAs and that peace in the State had come at a huge cost.

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