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Anonymous companies: “The federal government should do more to push back against the states that are helping transform the United States into a global offshore haven—and they should start to publicize the criminals, arms dealers, and kleptocrats that are taking advantage…” Casey Michel advocates an end to beneficial ownership secrecy. (Foreign Affairs)
UN: If you want to see kleptocracy up close, look at all those Bentleys idling outside the General Assembly in New York this week, writes Jay Newman. (WSJ)
Enablers: “Spray luminol across London’s major PR houses, and you’ll see similar blood spatters,” writes Sirin Kale. How do good people end up doing bad things? (Independent)
Brexit: Leaving the EU has doomed the UK’s fight against corruption, writes Oliver Bullough. (NYT)
Manafort: Trump’s former campaign manager was wiretapped twice by the FBI over alleged links to pro-Kremlin groups. Robert Mueller told him to expect an indictment. His investigation includes Manafort’s Ukraine work, in which a major New York law firm is now implicated. Manafort reportedly offered “private briefings” to Oleg Deripaska during the campaign (CNN, NYT, WaPo)
Veselnitskaya: KI Advisory Council member Michael Weiss investigates the finances of the Russian lawyer who met with Donald Trump Jr. during the presidential campaign. (CNN)
Propaganda: Time to register the Russian network as a foreign agent, argues Jamie Kirchick. Facebook will turn over thousands of Russian-bought advertisements to Congress. (WaPo)
China: A major new research paper by Anne-Marie Brady delves into Beijing’s aggressive political influence operations worldwide, using New Zealand as a particularly troubling case study. Steve Bannon secretly met with Wang Qishan, China’s anti-graft chief and the Party’s second most powerful official. (Wilson Center, FT)
Guo Wengui: The billionaire whistleblower, who recently applied for asylum in the U.S., writes of his intention “to expose the leviathan Chinese Mafia state…” A former business partner has accused Guo of framing him for crimes, as a separate $88 million lawsuit was thrown out of court in New York. (Washington Times, Reuters, Forbes)
North Korea: The White House imposed sweeping new sanctions against third parties dealing with Pyongyang. (NYT)
Ukraine: Igor Kolomoisky’s reward for allegedly stealing $1.8 billion? Cypriot and EU citizenship. Who pays for it? Ordinary Ukrainians, writes Daria Kaleniuk… “Ex-President Viktor Yanukovych-era Ukraine oligarchs are scaring away investors and aggravating fault lines between the county and its crucial allies,” argues Mark Pfeifle. (Kyiv Post, The Hill)
Venezuela: FinCEN issued a strong warning to U.S. financial institutions about dirty money coming from the Maduro regime. America should act more strongly,argue Michaela Frai and Alex Entz, including Global Magnitsky Act designations. (The Hill)
1MDB: The producer of The Wolf of Wall Street, allegedly funded with money stolen from the Malaysian development fund, settled a civil claim by the U.S. Justice Department to seize its assets. (Reuters)
Cryptocurrencies: They could open a new chapter in the Kremlin’s kleptocracy,writes Owen Matthews. Moscow requested the extradition from Greece of a Russian cybercrime suspect accused of $11,000 fraud – but he is also accused by the U.S. of masterminding a $4 billion Bitcoin scam. (Newsweek, RFE/RL)
Anonymous companies (again): Attorneys Peter Hardy and Juliana Garrick break down the proposed Corporate Transparency Act, which takes aim at U.S. anonymous companies… The Act would impose the same reporting requirements on formation agents as other financial institutions. (National Law Review)
Compiled Nate Sibley.
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