John Solomon is reporting today that Latvia is confirming that it flagged suspicious payments to Burisma and Hunter Biden back in February of 2016 and that it contacted Ukraine for more information:
JOHN SOLOMON – As the U.S. presidential race began roaring to life in 2016, authorities in the former Soviet republic of Latvia flagged a series of “suspicious” financial transactions to Hunter Biden and other colleagues at a Ukrainian natural gas company and sought Kiev’s help investigating, according to documents and interviews.
The Feb. 18, 2016 alert to Ukraine came from the Latvian prosecutorial agency responsible for investigating money laundering, and it specifically questioned whether Vice President Joe Biden’s younger son and three other officials at Burisma Holdings were the potential beneficiaries of suspect funds.
“The Office for Prevention of Laundering of Proceeds Derived from Criminal Activity … is currently investigating suspicious activity of Burisma Holdings Limited,” the Latvian agency also known as the FIU wrote Ukraine’s financial authorities.
The memo was released to me by the Ukrainian General Prosecutor’s Office and confirmed by the Latvian embassy to the United States.
Latvian authorities said they did not get any incriminating information back from Ukraine to warrant further investigation and did not take additional action in 2016.
But the memo adds to the mounting evidence that there was ongoing investigative activity surrounding Burisma Holdings and Hunter Biden’s compensation as a board member in the weeks just before Joe Biden forced the firing of the Ukraine prosecutor overseeing the Burisma investigation in spring 2016.
Here’s more on the transactions that Latvia flagged:
The Latvian law enforcement memo identified a series of loan payments totaling about $16.6 million that were routed from companies in Beliz and the United Kingdom to Burisma through Ukraine’s PrivatBank between 2012 and 2015.
The flagged funds were “partially transferred” to Hunter Biden, a board member at Burisma since May 2014, and three other officials working for the Ukrainian natural gas company, the Latvian memo said.
The letter asked Ukrainian officials for any evidence about whether the funds were involved in corruption and whether Ukrainian officials were investigating Burisma and the recipients of the money.
“On the grounds of possible legalization of proceeds derived from criminal activity and corruption, please grant us permission to share the information included in the reply to this request with Latvian law enforcement entities for intelligence purposes only,” the letter said.
Arturs Saburovs, the Third Secretary at the Latvian embassy in Washington, confirmed his country flagged the transactions in February 2016 after seeing public reports that Burisma was under investigation in Ukraine and that Hunter Biden served on the company’s board. He said Latvia did not receive any evidence back from Ukraine to further its investigation.
Is it any wonder that Latvia never heard back from Ukraine? Biden had their top prosecutor fired a month after the letter was sent and this may have been one of the reasons why, as Shokin was trying to investigate corruption within Burisma. It sure wouldn’t surprise me…
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— Ted Cruz (@tedcruz) December 17, 2019