Unravelling Rudolph Giuliani's labyrinthine ties to Ukraine

[nitpicker]

https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2019/oct/30/unravelling-rudolph-giulianis-labyrinthine-ties-to-ukraine

Unravelling Rudolph Giuliani’s labyrinthine ties to Ukraine

Andrew Roth in Kyiv

Wed 30 Oct 2019 08.30 GMT Last modified on Wed 30 Oct 2019 08.32 GMT

In 2003, Rudolph Giuliani made his first trip to Ukraine to lay a symbolic capsule at the site of a new memorial to the victims of 9/11, the tragedy from which he had emerged as “America’s mayor.”
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Sixteen years later, Rudolph Giuliani’s labyrinthine ties to Ukraine have emerged as a central element in the impeachment inquiry against his client, Donald Trump, as details emerge of what one senior diplomat called a “shadow foreign policy” to trigger an investigation into Joe Biden.

The following account is based on interviews with associates of Giuliani and his business partners in Ukraine, prosecutors familiar with his attempts to gather information about the Bidens, and officials and politicians concerned about the flamboyant former mayor.

The Guardian’s reporting shows that Giuliani boasted of his ties to Trump to gain access to high-ranking prosecutors and officials while his associates used the Giuliani name to bolster their reputations and legitimise dubious business ventures.

Giuliani’s ties became a US political story when two Soviet-born American businessmen, Lev Parnas and Igor Fruman, helped connect Giuliani with powerful Ukrainian prosecutors who claimed to have information about a scandal tied to Biden’s son, Hunter, and in turn sought to trade in on Giuliani’s name to advance their own business interests.
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A crucial contact for Giuliani was Yuriy Lutsenko, an embattled top prosecutor who faced being fired after the election of the Ukrainian president, Volodymyr Zelenskiy.

Lutsenko, who has himself been accused of corruption by civil society activists, said he met Giuliani because he was ready to discuss a joint official investigation into Burisma – the gas company where Hunter Biden worked – and also to pursue a separate investigation into money stolen by the previous government.
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But the 2003 visit heralded a decade of consulting and publicity trips to Ukraine for Giuliani, who has traded on his US political connections and his reputation as the mayor who steered New York through the Trade Centre attack to collect a small fortune in lucrative speaking fees and security contracts in the ex-Soviet state.
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For many Ukrainians, Giuliani was seen as a bridge into exclusive political and decision-making circles that could review US policy toward Ukraine.
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