Holy Cow, my head is spinning! Earlier today, Michael Avenatti sent out a tweet. He posted some pictures, taken on 12/12/16 (during the Transition), showing Michael Cohen, Michael Flynn and some people in a Trump Tower elevator, behind Cohen. Who are these guys?
Some hours later, Avenatti explains. Seems the bald man in the elevator is Ahmed al-Rumaihi, a former Qatar diplomat and the current head of Qatar’s Sovereign Wealth Fund.
Interesting that Al-Rumaihi bragged about bribing administration officials in court documents, for sure. But what could those bribes be related to? I obviously don’t know, but the minute I learned who Al-Rumaihi was, my gears started turning.
Below are some bullet points that might help us flush out what could be going on here:
- The Qatar Sovereign Wealth Fund (along with Glencore) purchased an 11 billion dollar stake (19.5%) in Rosneft, the Russian Oil Company.
- Rosneft, headed by Russian Igor Sechin, figured predominately in the Steele Dossier. According to Steele’s sources, Sechin was eager to have sanctions lifted, and offered Carter Page/Trump associates the brokerage of up to 19% in Rosneft. The sale of Rosneft was announced by Putin on State Television on 12/6/16, just 6 days before the above elevator pictures.
- Jared Kushner’s father, Charles, attempted to secure funding from Qatar, both before and after the election, in hopes of digging 666 5th Avenue out of looming financial problems. The deal with Qatar never materialized.
- In June of 2017, and shortly after the Kushner/Qatar deal failed, Saudi Arabia and the UAE abruptly organized a blockade of Qatar citing Qatar’s support of terrorism. The blockade included diplomatic and economic sanctions along with travel bans.
- President Trump was very supportive of this blockade. Mattis and Tillerson called for calmness, probably because the US had 10,000 troops in Qatar at Al-Udeid Air Base. But Trump boasted about the blockade….and even appeared to take credit for it. Jared Kushner was also said to have backed this blockade.
- Also of interest, In March of 2018, it was reported that Qatar had accumulated information on Kushner, but were declining to share it with Special Counsel Robert Mueller.
Please feel free to add comments….because I’m not sure what to make of all this. But I am getting “the hairs are standing up on the back of my neck” type feeling.