Igor Sechin, CEO of Rosneft. Photo by Valery Sharifulin/TASS
By Catherine A. Fitzpatrick
The Intercept and Slate have reporting about Jared Kushner and his attempts to get loans from Qatar and his threats against Qatar and the question I asked the other day, "Do you know who else got money from Qatar? Rosneft" is now being linked back to the much-maligned Steele memo. The Intercept focuses on the Qatar piece only and doesn't link in Page; Jed Handelsman Shugerman links the Qatar revelations about Kushner to the Page story.
Are we there yet? I don't think so, although Mueller continues to surprise even the Twitterati again and again. My own sense is that nothing will be found to indict Page, and that the indictment of Kushner -- if it does come -- will not help indite Page.
Skip to the sections outlined in red if you want to see what there is on Page in Moscow -- not much.
I've always thought the Rosneft part of the Steele memo was one of the most odd, and garbled. Michael Weiss and I have a multi-part series coming out on the Steele memo soon.
The summary of the section on Page and Rosneft in the Steele dossier speaks of giving Trump the whole 19% stake -- which seemed absurd, as that would be way too big a gift for Trump ($11 billion!) and not necessary, given that he was already cooperating and already likely compromised by the Kremlin. To put this sale into American hands is simply counterintuitive -- America is still Russia's enemy even if they maneuvered to get Trump into office -- and they've had some (claimed) buyer's remorse. The Kremlin already got the change in the GOP platform by Manafort; it already had Page on a string; it already had Tillerson's friendship with Sechin and willingness to lift sanctions -- Moscow did not need to pay $11 billion or even the brokerage fee for $11 billion to buy the lifting of sanctions that would come either for free or a lot less -- nor would Moscow want to have this highly weird deal get the scrutiny it would if Americans benefited. None of it makes sense to Russia-watchers, if you read all the press on Rosneft for the year before the sale, which I did, and reported on.
Rosneft, the Kremlin, and state media had said for a year that this sale would not go to any Westerners; there was even a scandal where Sechin sued RBC for reporting a Kremlin warning to BP to stay off the deal. It was always said it would be "Asians," which could mean "Middle Easterners" also.
Then in the actual section of the Steele memo that contains the report from Russia, as distinct from the summary of the report, there is mention of the brokerage of the deal, not the deal itself. The discrepancy here within the dossier itself between "the stake itself" and "the brokerage of the stake" is part of what makes this section so weak (and possibly disinformation) -- but it may be a simple mistake -- the summary misreported the detail in the dossier. That makes more sense as a possible gift to Trump via Page, but is still awfully weird given Julia Ioffe's reporting.
Naturally, I've wondered for a long time given my long-time critique of Ioffe and her tendency to moral equivalency -- and at one time, a realism about Putin that most have forgotten she had -- if this entire article's purpose was to minimize Page, ridicule him, and make him seem like "not a thing" as a form of distraction. Certainly the Russian officials and state gas executives that Ioffe could reach would definitely be up to such a distraction also known as "disinformation".
To be sure, there are two independent sources in Ioffe's report which then can't be accused of Russian disinformation -- and therefore the report that Page "is a nothing" may be true: one is Bill Browder (a very prominent Kremlin critic now, owner of Hermitage Capital and campaigner for justice in the murder of his tax consultant Serige Magnitsky, while in Russian custody), who said he never heard of Page, despite being deeply involved in Russian investments in the past -- Page was an owner of Gazprom shares and claimed he helped big Gazprom deals. The other independent source for Ioffe is Sergei Aleksashenko who was formerly deputy chairman of the Central Bank of Russia who essentially lives in exile now in the U.S. and is part of a group of prominent emigres involved in 4FreeRussia, a Washington-based group that publishes substantive criticism of the Kremlin and President Vladimir Putin and which advocates liberal democracy in their homeland. Aleksashenko sounds exasperated in Ioffe's telling at these people trying to get information about him from Page because Page was his subordinate when Aleksashenko was head of Merill Lynch in Russia:
In 2004 Page moved to Moscow, where he became an energy consultant with Merrill Lynch. As Page tells it, it was while working as an investment banker that he struck up a relationship with Gazprom. He advised Gazprom on transactions, including a deal to buy a stake in an oil and gas eld near Sakhalin, the desolate island on Russia’s Pacific coast. He bought Gazprom shares.
According to Politico, few people in Moscow’s foreign business community knew of him. Those who did were underwhelmed. “He wasn’t great and he wasn’t terrible,” his former boss, Sergei Aleksashenko, said, adding that Page was “without any special talents or accomplishments,” “in no way exceptional,” and “a gray spot.”
I've always thought that journalists were missing an opportunity by not going back and asking Aleksashenko more pertinent if larger questions, such as: "Do you think it is possible that Rosneft could have intended to sell their stake to Trump or any American, and do you think it is possible that they would have given the brokerage of this deal to Carter Page?" and I think Aleksashenko would likely explain why this would seem absurd. But he should be asked.
Reuters did quote Aleksashenko's blog:
“The main question in relation to this transaction, as ever, still sounds like this: Who is the real buyer of a 19.5 percent stake in Rosneft?” Sergey Aleksashenko, a former deputy head of Russia’s central bank, wrote in a blog last week
His blog post -- very complicated -- explains basically why no privatization took place, because of the issue of Rosneft's dividends and the fact that it is a state-owned company and the price of oil fluctuating -- and the need for the Russian state to fill its coffers for social expenditure. Here he explains further for RosBalt how Sechin benefitted politically and financially from this deal. Here in this interview with a Ukrainian business publication BIN.ua he explains more starkly - there was a big show of having Sechin come to Putin in front of the cameras and announce the sale of Rosneft for the good of the Motherland -- except the sale wasn't quite made and the money wasn't quite received then...and it's still a mystery. Aleksashenko further commented on a remark made by Sechin during the affair of Ulyukayev, the former minister of economic development said to be caught in a bribe which some believe was a set-up to quiet him and punish him over what he knew about Bashneft, another mysterious oil deal.
I cite all these complexities to make the point that Aleksashenko provides you with copious and complex detail: this was a dodgy deal, and the Russians would hardly want any spotlight on it by roping in Trump or even Page. And it's dodgy all on its own even without any Page relationship, which we still haven't proven is there.
Page being discounted as a nothing -- by either official sources bent on disinformation or independent sources who actually knew he was a nothing and say so -- may or may not be it's own form of even more complex disinformation -- we don't know.
Even the way the Russian spies are quoted as ridiculing Page leads many to conclude he's "not a thing". Of course, it wouldn't be the first time that Russia used an obscure cut-out (like the professor from Monaco who has now disappeared) to perform some active measure. And Page could be a bumbling idiot AND a "nothing" and still turn out to be "a thing" -- after all, the FBI got four -- count 'em -- four FISA warrants to follow him and as we now know, their request did not hinge on Steele's memo.
But now with Qatar being actively researched by Mueller, the same Qatar of the Rosneft is being examined, as is Page all over again.
The deal was announced December 7, one day before Page arrived in Moscow, and the reporting on it later indicated how strange it was as to its financing and sources. As Alexander Aleksashenko has explained in his numerous posts and quotes on this affair, Russia essentially sold the stake to itself, to temporarily have Putin make a show of filling state coffers with the proceeds of a state asset to help social costs that came from Western sanctions. Again: the Rosneft deal has weirdness all in its own right, without any Carter Page or Trump.
Let's review what Page said in Moscow by examining the Russian media.
Interestingly, here is how Page's trip to Moscow was reported in the Russian media. RBC, which was once an independent business news service and has recently fallen under more control (its former editors were forced to leave and it is now managed by TASS editors), had this:
RBC reported Dec 12 2016 that Page spoke at a press conference in Moscow where he was introduced by Shlomo Veber, the rector of the New Economic School. He had come to Moscow December 8.
He said Russian leader German Gref, head of Sberbank, and Igor Sechin, head of Rosnef were "leaders capable of activating the Russian-American dialogue," RBC reported.
Page said he had contacts with Rosneft representatives but declined to give their names.
"Very often it is said of me that I had some sort of contacts with Sechin. Of course this would be a great honor for me, but there weren't any, it's not so," Page was quoted as saying by RBC.
He also mentioned the contribution Rex Tillerson of Exxon had made, who was named as the chief candidate for secretary of state in the Trump Administration. Page said "This is an example worthy of imitation," RBC quoted him as saying.
A Russian journalist asked him what he thought of the male friendship between Trump and Putin, and Page said he didn't believe in it, and this was an illusion. He refused to answer any concrete questions from journalists about his business interests in Russia and connections with the team of the president-election in the US, RBC said.
"Page only said this was connected to his obligations under a non-disclosure agreement, however he confirmed that he attended meetings and briefings with Trump," said RBC.
Page outlined five areas to work on for improvement of Russian-American relations: development of business ties, scientific cooperation, work with the young generation, improvement of the quality of media, and learning to react quickly to changing reality.
So: mention of Sechin -- and Gref -- invocation of secrecy and denial of his meeting with Sechin. I was able to pinpoint Sechin himself in Moscow on July 5, 2016 at the Venezuelan Embassy in Moscow for the national Venezuelan holiday -- Sechin went on to visit Caracas and signed a deal there on July 28 -- but we can't prove he was in Moscow on July 6 OR that he met with Page. And the levels issue seems incredible -- the reverse equivalent would be like Tillerson meeting with some lowly Russian gas consultant that maybe the FBI had as an asset, witting or no.
So TASS, which is the Russian state news service reported Page as actually mentioning Glencore on December 12,2017:
(This is reverse translation from the Russian, i.e. likely Page spoke in English as his Russian is apparently not that good.)
"I had the opportunity to meet with one of the top managers of the company Rosneft. The recent Rosneft deal in which the Qatar fund and Glenclore could take place is unfortunately a good example of how American private companies are limited to a large extent due to the influence of sanctions," TASS quoted him as saying.
Asked if he met with representatives of Moscow, Page replied:
"I think that in a new era of relations between Russia and the US more efforts need to be applied in support of the new US administration, from the perspective of business," said Page. In his opinion, the central element of relations between the US and Russia should become the transformation of the role of the private sector. "You know, Igor Ivanovich [Sechin -- TASS] is the chief advocate of this."
Asked if sanctions could be abolished or lessoned by the US regarding Russia in the new administration, Page replied: "it is early to speak of this still" since the main challenge is the inaccurate perceptions of each other by the two sides.
Carter Page also refuted his contacts with Russian officials and representatives of business circles, including Igor Sechin, head of Rosneft, who is in the US sanctions list, said TASS.
"The most classic examples [of fake news--TASS] are of course the claims of my contact with Igor Ivanovich [Sechin--TASS] which would be a great honor but which did not take place, said Page.
So tantalizing that he mentions Glencore -- after the deal is announced -- but not proof of anything. And tantalizing that he mentions "a top manager of Rosneft" -- without a name -- but this may be Alexander Baranov, head of investor relations with whom Page met during his July 2017 trip and evidently again in December 2017 -- which he admits in his congressional testimony, but about whom he says no "quid pro quo" of a Rosneft stake in exchange for living US sanctions on Russia was ever made.
Page also mentions Glencore in his Congressional testimony where he tries to turn the tables on members pestering him with queries about his activities in Russia, by saying that Glencore was founded by Marc Rich, who died in 2013, who was pardoned by Bill Clinton. This is cut and pasted on Imgur for the anti-anti-Trump conspirators and originated as Reddit fodder.
Rich was indeed a controversial figure, Clinton later expressed some regrets about this pardon.
Remember, Glencore's part in the RBC deal is minor -- it was only 300 million euros in a 10.2 billion euro deal but the bigger prize is its option to sell Russian oil later.
One wonders how even this minor stake was legal under sanctions but for one, Glencore is an Anglo-Swiss company, not an American company, and for two there are loopholes and maybe they were found; at least "shock" was expressed in "the City".
Glencore has now in turn sold that stake to the Chinese state oil company
The sale was seemingly at a loss, but then there's this:
On paper, after nine months he shows a small loss: Glencore retains a 0.5 percent equity stake in Rosneft, now worth around 250 million euros. But crucially, traders expect Glencore to hold on to the most valuable benefit of the deal: an agreement to let his firm sell hundreds of millions of barrels of Russian oil to global markets over five years.
The mystery around this deal is of course what enables some to go looking for Trump connections. Reuters reports again:
When that deal was reached in December, participants did not fully disclose the beneficiaries of their off-shore investment vehicle to the public, or explain which Russian banks were among those providing loans.
So this is where Slate's timeline comes in:
Dec. 8: Carter Page—as he later confirmed in his own congressional testimony—meets with Rosneft executives, and then flies to London to discuss new business opportunities in Kazakhstan with Gazprom officials.
Dec. 9: The “largest oil deal in Russia’s history” is announced.
Dec. 13: Kushner meets Sergey Gorkov, who chairs Russia’s government-owned VE Bank (VEB) and is Putin’s close confidant. Analysts have described VEB as Putin’s “private slush fund,” a source of money independent from official Russia budgeting. VEB is under strict U.S. sanctions.
Dec. 14: Gorkov reportedly immediately flies to Japan to meet with Putin.
Dec. 29: Obama orders new Russian sanctions for election hacking and interference. On the same day: Flynn calls Kislyak five times about Russian sanctions. Trump tweets about Putinthe next day, calling him “very smart” for not responding to Obama’s sanctions before Trump has had a chance to transition into office.
The Rosneft sale was right after Trump’s victory but before the inauguration. It was also right after Kushner’s push for a secret communications link to the Kremlin through the Russia embassy that U.S. intelligence couldn’t access, and right before Kushner’s meeting with Putin’s banker and confidant Gorkov.
Except one mistake - Rosneft's deal was announced on December 7, as we know from Vedomosti, Russia's (still somewhat independent) business daily. Meduza, a Russian news site now based in Riga and run by editors who fled Lenta, also reported it that day. The New York Times, which has a Moscow bureau, also reported the sale December 7, 2017. It may have not been reported in the US because of the difference in time zones until the 8th or 9th at other outlets, hence the mistake.
So Page knew about the sale, as did the Russian media, and commented on it in Moscow at a press conference.
Even so, once you see "VEB Bank" (Vneshekonombank or literally Foreign Economic Bank) mentioned in Steele and the New York Times coverage then there is more cause for "following the networks".
Of course even back in June 2017, the Times had this:
Now VEB is at the center of an international firestorm that threatens the Trump presidency because the bank’s chief [Sergei Gorkov] — a prominent graduate of Russia’s spy school — met with Jared Kushner, President Trump’s son-in-law, during the presidential transition. That meeting is a focus of a federal counterintelligence investigation about possible collusion between the Trump campaign and the Russian government.
***
On that same trip, Mr. Gorkov met with Mr. Kushner. The nature of the meeting, which remains in dispute, followed a session between Mr. Kushner and the Russian ambassador, Sergey I. Kislyak, about opening a communications channel with Russian officials during the presidential transition, according to current and former American officials
So it's not as if The Intercept is breaking this news about VEB, it's just linking new revelations about Qatar to the overall Kushner story.
Where are we on this? We are still nowhere. Page has been under investigation by the FBI for ages with 4 FISA warrants and there isn't any indictment yet -- and may never be one. As we know from the Alger Hiss story, this may not mean he is innocent.
Maybe Mueller will get something on Kushner -- this may not tie up to Glencore or Rosneft.
Let's look at one more article covering Page's trip to Moscow in December 2016, in the state-owned RIA Novosti:
What is the purpose of your visit to Moscow?
I have travelled to Moscow over the course of most of my life and worked with the Russian people. I am firmly convinced that the possibilities for cooperation with the private sector of the Russian economy have never been as great as they will be in the coming years. Despite the hostile Western policy and the inevitable logical reaction of Moscow which has restricted these opportunities in the last few decades, the opportunities of the present day are unique. I am working on several potential projects within the framework of support of that trend.
Are there any problems now with forming the Administration?
I am not directly connected with any activities in organizing the transition. However, judging from the conversations with my close acquaintances in Washington and New York which are drawn into this process the work is going exceptionally well.
Do you expect that in the near future sanctions with regard to Russia will be removed? Do American companies want to return to the Russian market? If yes, in what sectors, above all? What do you think about the Rosneft deal?
The wish of Americans and also European companies to return to the Russian market is great. The interest extends to numerous diverse sectors. Hostile attempts to punish Rosneft and its team of senior executives with the help of Western sanctions mainly harmed Western companies and not the target aimed at. The innovative deal made this week accentuates these restrictions since many potentially strategic investment partners were excluded.
Do you expect that the new US Administration will implement a policy of recognition of the Creima? What role and what place will Ukraine be given in the new Administration?
The history of events of recent years in the Ukraine [note the Russian use of "na Ukraine" instead of "v Ukraine--CAF] as a whole and Crimea in particular can be one of the most egregious examples of 'fake news' in recent times. The level of disinformation on which decisions have been built by external players and their influence on this country was catastrophic. I am convinced that there will be new opportunities to overcome these mistaken conceptions and the incorrect vector which was established for Ukraine."
Note that everything Page says here is calculated to be part of his denial of involvement in the claims of the Steele dossier.
Regardless of whether Page is ever indicted, he should be morally condemned for doing business with a government rightly under Western sanctions for its mass crimes against humanity, namely in the Ukrainian and Syrian wars but one could add also its seizure of Georgian territory and the Georgian war regardless of the clownish nature of Saakashvili. (I always explain the Georgian war as follows: "Russia is responsible, Georgia is to blame, the US is involved." I think that about sums it up: Russia began handing out Russian passports in a provocative move that international institutions could only wring their hands about years before the invasion; Russian planes buzzed Georgian air space before the invasion; Russian "peacekeepers" are self-described and represented no international institution or consensus.)
It will be interesting to see some people's heads explode as they first try to explain that Russia is poor and mismanaged and corrupt and therefore can't possibly launch nuclear weapons, and doesn't have enough money to pay its pensioners, but yes, is a great business opportunity (!) Sergei Brin once called Russia "Nigeria with snow." I've always thought that was too harsh especially given that Sergei was all too happy to hire Russia's human stock, educated computer engineers and programmers. The Russian state is responsible for much of the world's hacking, both financial and political, and malware and spam which cost billions of dollars. Under a different leadership, this shall we say "energy" might be converted to programming the world's back offices and mobile games and more. Others have summed up Russia's economy currently as that of "hunter-gatherers" -- i.e. oil, caviar, minerals. Well, that's harsh, too -- again under better leadership, this might be turned to cooperation.
It's helpful to remember what Amb. Michael McFaul said, former envoy to Russia, immensely disliked by the Kremlin (and criticized by me for his opposition to the Magnitsky Act): even during the reset, there wasn't that much business with Russia. There just isn't that much trade with Russia and the US. There are some long-term oil and gas deals -- or were -- that one could argue didn't yield big profits given the time and investments required for them; there were purchases of engines to launch space rockets, arguably cheaper for the US space program -- that's gone now. There was this and that -- caviar, cardboard, perhaps some seabuck thorn oil (although that mainly comes from Central Asia) or pine tar extract (but America has its own). Truly, there has not ever been much trade between the US and Russia for lots of reasons.
And there won't be, until there is better leadership and reform, as there were under Gorbachev and Yeltsin. But we don't have better leadership, and Russia will never be part of the West or the West's friend, given everything, and that must always be kept in mind.
And now in retrospect -- Page's interview was 15 months ago -- we see the Trump Administration, for a combination of reasons, hasn't gone in the direction Page or Sechin for that matter hoped. Sanctions remain in place, the new representative on Ukraine, Kurt Volker, is quite critical of Russia as the main problem in the war in Ukraine - the fake news is all in Page's mind as a fellow traveler. America is even supposed to give and/or sell Javelin missiles to Ukraine now in the long-delayed implementation of a Congressional mandate.
This might all end this year, of course, we don't know. There are certain signs that Trump's Russian policy is better than Trump himself has let on -- and this is no thanks to Trump but whatever grown-ups do remain in the Administration or were always part of the government service.
Below find the sections of Page's testimony in Congress:
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