Compromising Biden: Former US Vice President Blackmail Ukraine With Billion Dollars

American journalist John Solomon published in the publication The Hill the results of an investigation proving that former US Vice President Joe Biden blackmailed the Ukrainian authorities in 2016, demanding that the prosecutor general Viktor Shokin be sacked. Otherwise, Ukraine would not have received 1 billion dollars in loan guarantees. Biden gave the authorities of the country 6 hours to decide.

Joe Biden and Petro Poroshenko. Photo: Depositphotos

Two years after leaving his post, Joe Biden himself spoke about the incident. In his own words, he threatened President of Ukraine Petro Poroshenko in March 2016 with the fact that the Obama administration would not give Ukraine a billion dollars in credit guarantees, which at that time would have led the country to bankruptcy. The condition was the dismissal of Prosecutor General Viktor Shokin.

“I said, ‘You won’t get a billion. I'm going to leave here in six hours. If the prosecutor doesn't get fired, you don't get any money,'” Biden himself recalls, insisting that the situation at that moment posed a threat to President Barack Obama. “He was fired and someone was appointed who took a confident position at that time,” adds the former vice president (from March 29 to May 12, 2016, Yuriy Sevruk temporarily performed the duties; from May 12, Yuriy Lutsenko became prosecutor general - approx. ForumDaily).

Interviews with six senior Ukrainian officials corroborate Biden's view, although they say the pressure was applied over several months, starting in late 2015 and into the early months of 2016, so it wasn't just about six hours of one day.

Be that as it may, Poroshenko and the Ukrainian parliament interrupted Shokin’s term of office as prosecutor general. When Shokin was fired, a squall of harsh criticism fell on him in Ukraine and among some US officials due to the fact that he did not file a sufficient number of accusations against corrupt officials.

Solomon writes that Ukrainian officials revealed to him one important detail that Biden himself did not tell. The fired attorney general led a wide-ranging investigation into corruption at the gas firm Burisma Holdings, where one of the board members was Hunter Biden, the son of the former vice president.

Former Prosecutor General of Ukraine Viktor Shokin. Photo: Depositphotos

Bank records show that Hunter Biden's US company Rosemont Seneca Partners LLC received regular transfers (usually more than $166 per month) from Burisma into its account from the spring of 000 to the fall of 2014 - precisely during the period when Vice President Biden was the top US official dealing with Ukraine and its tense relations with Russia.

The official dossier of the Attorney General for the Burisma case, which was handed over to John Solomon by senior Ukrainian officials, shows that prosecutors identified Hunter Biden, Devon Archer’s business partner, and their firm Rosemont Seneca as potential recipients of the money.

John Solomon corresponded with Shokin himself. The former attorney general told the journalist that before his dismissal, he developed “specific plans” for the investigation, which “included interrogations and other criminal investigation procedures regarding all members of the executive council, including Hunter Biden.”

He added: "I would like to emphasize the fact that in Ukraine there is a principle of presumption of innocence" and that he could not continue to describe the evidence.

Joe Biden's spokesman William Rousseau, as well as Hunter Biden did not respond to Solomon's messages The Rosemont Seneca Partners LLC phone number is not serviced in Washington.

The terms of the appointment of Hunter Biden and Archer to the board of directors of Burisma in the past were paid attention to by the New York Times newspaper (December 2015 of the year) and conservative writer Peter Schweitzer in his book (in 2016 year).

Although Biden did not say anything about his son, the authorities in the USA and Ukraine reported that both Biden and his office should have been aware of the investigation into Burisma and his son. And that's why:

• the appointment of Hunter Biden to the board was widely reported in the American media;
• the US Embassy in Kiev coordinated Biden’s work in the country and publicly discussed the Attorney General’s case against Burisma more than once;
• The UK took very public action against Burisma while Joe Biden worked with this government on Ukraine issues;
• Biden’s office confirmed that he recognized Hunter Biden’s involvement in the Burisma affair (the New York Times article, which appeared four months before Biden instigated Shokin’s dismissal; in this article the vice-president’s office suggested that Hunter Biden was a lawyer who could engage in their own private commercial transactions);
• President Obama appointed Biden as his chief of staff for Ukraine in February 2014, after a popular revolution toppled pro-Russian President Viktor Yanukovych and Moscow sent military forces into Ukraine's Crimea.

According to Schweizer’s book, Vice President Biden met with Archer in April 2014 of the year when Archer was appointed to the board of directors of Burisma. A month later, Hunter Biden was taken to the board as an observer for the Burisma legal team.

But the Ukrainian investigation and Joe Biden's attempt to dismiss the prosecutor Shokin did not have much public discussion.

Much of the investigative work of the attorney general regarding Burisma focused on three separate cases, and most of them stopped abruptly after Shokin was fired. The most famous case of Burisma was transferred to another Ukrainian agency, closely associated with the US Embassy in Kiev: the National Anti-Corruption Bureau of Ukraine (NABU), as the case materials confirm, and confirmed by the acting Prosecutor General of Ukraine Yury Lutsenko.

After Ukrainian officials did not submit the necessary documents in the required time, NABU closed both this case and the investigation related to the alleged remittances. According to Lutsenko, the Prosecutor General’s Office successfully obtained a multi-million decision on the tax evasion case. He did not specify who became the actual defendant.

As a result, the Biden family appears to have avoided incriminating foreign investigations both during the final days of the Obama administration and during the 2016 election. But two years later, when Joe Biden’s election campaign began (Biden is the main presidential candidate from the Democratic Party, he is called Trump’s main competitor in the 2020 elections - ForumDaily), Yuriy Lutsenko began to study the reasons for closing the Burisma case.

Looking through the materials of the investigation, Lutsenko discovered that "members of the council, as well as another legal entity from the USA, Rosemont Seneca Partners LLC, received funds for consulting services."

Lutsenko said that some of the evidence known to him in the Burisma case may be of interest to US authorities, and he would like to present this information to US Attorney General William Barr, especially data on the interference of the vice president.

“Unfortunately, Biden linked this assistance with some personnel problems and changes in the prosecutor’s office,” Lutsenko added in personal communication with the author of the article.

Prosecutor General of Ukraine Yuriy Lutsenko. Photo: Depositphotos

Nazar Kholodnitsky, the lead anti-corruption prosecutor on Lutsenko's team, confirmed that part of the Burisma investigation was reopened in 2018 after Joe Biden made his statements. “We were able to get this thing going again,” Kholodnitsky said.

But he added that the investigation was being delayed due to the collection of evidence. “We don’t see any results a year after the opening of the case due to some external influence,” Kholodnitsky noted, refusing to elaborate.

Ukraine is now at the center of a fierce presidential election, remains a frequent target for intelligence operations in neighboring Russia and suffers from rampant political corruption throughout the country. So many Americans might be skeptical of the Burisma case, and that would be fair.

What makes Lutsenko’s explanation convincing? The fact that the federal authorities in America in a completely different case disclosed financial reports showing how much Hunter Biden and Archer received from Burisma, while Joe Biden acted as Obama in Ukraine.

Between April 2014 and October 2015, more than 3 million US dollars were transferred from Burisma to the account associated with Biden and Archer, Rosemont Seneca. This is evidenced by the financial records included in the documents on the unrelated case against Archer, which is being considered by a federal court in Manhattan.

In most months, when Burisma money flow was observed, on the same day two electronic transfers were sent to the account associated with Rosemont Seneca for the amount of 83 333,33 dollars each. From the same account, as a rule, one or several payments in the amount from 5000 to 25 000 dollars each were sent to Hunter Biden.

Lutsenko said that members of the board of a Ukrainian company can legally pay for their work themselves if this benefits the company. But prosecutors could not determine the nature and purpose of the payments in the case of Biden and Archer due to the termination of the investigation.

Regarding Joe Biden's intervention in Shokin's dismissal in the midst of the Burisma investigation, Lutsenko suggested discussing this issue with US Attorney General Barr: "Of course, I would be happy to talk with him on this issue."

Фото: Depositphotos

The author of the article notes that every American deserves the right to be presumed innocent until evidence is made public or an indictment is issued, especially when foreigners are involved in the cases. The same presumption should be given to Joe Biden, Hunter Biden, Devon Archer and Burisma in the case of Ukraine.

Nevertheless, Biden should have answered some difficult questions in view of his preparations for the 2020 presidential election of the year, the author believes:

• Was it appropriate for your son and his company to profit in Ukraine, while you served as the main specialist in Ukrainian politics?
• What kind of work was done for the money that Hunter Biden received?
• Do you know about the Burisma investigation?
• When it was publicly announced that your son was working for Burisma, was it worth it to stop using US policies to put pressure on the prosecutor who publicly prosecuted Burisma?

Author: John Solomon is an award-winning investigative reporter for The Hill who has spent years covering US and FBI intelligence failures before the 11/XNUMX attacks, cases of federal scientists abusing adopted children, cases of drug experimentation on US veterans, and numerous cases political corruption.

Read also on ForumDaily:

American journalist announced new details of Ukraine’s interference in the US presidential election

The US Embassy forced Ukraine to abandon inspections of Soros funds during the American elections

There are data on the possible intervention of Ukraine in the US presidential elections in favor of Hillary Clinton

To bribe Biden: how the authorities in Ukraine have corrupted the American democrats and influenced the US elections in favor of Clinton

Do you want more important and interesting news about life in the USA and immigration to America? — support us donate! Also subscribe to our page Facebook. Select the “Priority in display” option and read us first. Also, don't forget to subscribe to our РєР ° РЅР ° Р »РІ Telegram  and Instagram- there is a lot of interesting things there. And join thousands of readers ForumDaily New York — there you will find a lot of interesting and positive information about life in the metropolis.