Trump’s Highest Bidder, Gertler? Sanctions Reprieve Lifted – Gertler, Magnitsky, DRC

Israeli billionaire Dan Gertler (Screen capture YouTube)

Dan Gertler and the Magnitsky Sanctions, Loopholes, State Sanctioned Violations, Trump, Guiliani and Billions

We have written and opined at great lengths about Dan Gertler, the mining tycoon sanctioned under the Magnitsky Act sanctions and the final gift from President Trump to Gertler, a lifting of those sanctions. Make no mistake, that lifting was unsurprising when coupled with the Guliani Ukraine affair. To those of us who followed the ever-changing political landscape in the DRC, the US’s unbridled support of an otherwise undemocratic election in the DRC, the securities’ firms that played a role in the movement of information, and the tail numbers of Gertler’s planes coupled with the travels of Trump’s personal attorney, Rudolph Guiliani, this political-financial network was foreseeable. It was our opinion then and now, that Guiliani was paid for his liaison services, which were blessed through a web of quasi-legitimate securities’ firms. Beyond that, in what capacity Guiliani was traveling to the Ukraine fairly regularly, and his labyrinthine ties to Ukraine at that time remain the subject of debate.

We have opined about the various loopholes and veritable crawl spaces that have allowed Gertler access to millions, if not billions of dollars, otherwise unavailable under the Magnitsky Sanctions Regime. Some of this money was allegedly owed to Gertler by Glencore. The “praise” bestowed upon Gertler by foreign diplomats is almost embarrassing, but may have been required to get cooperating countries on board with the payment scheme. The workaround was craftily organized by funneling money through a payment system of mazes to Gertler via a series of Euro-based workarounds which required the assistance of the Swiss banking network and US Government intervention. It is unlikely the Swiss would have been involved absent a very public statement by the US. It is our opinion that the loopholes were identified and manipulated by President Trump and, in our opinion, Rudolph Guiliani, Paul Manaford and others within the Trump orbit.

Whether or not we have it all perfectly figured out remains a job for those with far higher pay grades.

While Gertler claims all of his actions in the DRC have been above-board, we think that depends upon whose morality and ethics one is using as the exemplar upon which all else is measured. As we see the world, Gertler’s almost unforgivable use of underpaid members of the DRC to afford him unquantifiable wealth is not a paragon of the divine intervention of his religious system of beliefs. Moreover, Gertler’s willingness to manipulate financial systems such that banks, investment companies and frankly heads of states and countries made his acquisition of wealth all possible, is all the more unsettling.

Washington, DC, Free and Fair Elections, the DRC, Dan Gertler, Mer, Magnitsky and Guiliani…

Flag of the Democratic Republic of Congo

Mer, Kabila, the Congo, Dan Gertler and… Rudi Guiliani… and then There’s Magnitsky

This opinion is written following a brillliant article that came out in Buzzfeed on December 30, 2020 and should be read in the context of that article entitled:

A Secretive Company Needed To Convince Washington That Congo’s Election Would Be “Free And Fair.” It Found A Friendly Ear Among Trump Allies.

A BuzzFeed News investigation, based on thousands of pages of documents and more than 100 interviews in the US, Congo, and Europe, provides a first-ever look inside Mer’s aggressive campaign to influence the Trump administration and serve Kabila’s interests. It shows how such efforts can shape foreign policy in ways unbeknownst to both the public and senior government officials, through meetings and phone calls that leave few witnesses and little trace of the private influences involved.

In this case, the most powerful nation in the world swept aside authoritarian abuses — even when many of its own top diplomats thought such a decision flew in the face of US interests.

Despite all the promises that Kabila’s proxies made in Washington that year, Congo’s election, ultimately held in December 2018, was neither free nor fair. Citing voting data that leaked after the election, international observers said that it was brazenly rigged in favor of a candidate with whom Kabila had struck a secret power-sharing deal. Kabila would officially step down, but he would still command Congo’s security forces, his allies would still hold top Cabinet positions, and his party would still wield a legislative majority.

Within days of the election, the leaked voting data sparked protests across Congo. Heads of state in Europe and Africa called for an international investigation. The US echoed the denunciation.

Mer’s efforts in Washington looked doomed.

But a month after the election, in January 2019, the Trump administration suddenly dropped its objections and instead praised “Kabila’s commitment to becoming the first president in DRC history to cede power peacefully through an electoral process.” The decision to reverse course came from Secretary of State Mike Pompeo, BuzzFeed News has learned. But it shocked veteran diplomats and rank-and-file State Department officials who had crafted the initial policy. And it put an end to the international coalition that was forming to examine the election.

Read the Buzzfeed article in its entirety here.

Let me refresh your memory, on November 7, 2019, in a follow up to an article I posted on November 6, 2019, I published an opinion piece entitled “Dan Gertler and the OFAC Sanctions – Someone Had to Have Been Negotiating with Glencore” wherein I corrected the record as to dates from the previously posted article and presented my theories. The relevant corrected dates of that article, however, only serve to substantiate my theory, that there were a series of well-timed announcements, one corresponding though seemingly unconnected to the other and all subtly buried in a haze of smoke and mirrors. Then came the pandemic and any modicum of an investigation into the activities of the relevant players fell to the wayside.

I maintain that there were lobbyists behind the scenes negotiating on Gertler’s behalf with respect to the Magnitsky Act Sanctions and corresponding payments from Glencore allegedly due to Gertler. Gertler’s proven connection to Kabila providing a backdrop. In 2019 I did not complicate matters, however, by adding in the Congo/Glencore connection because I had fully intended to fill in that piece at some future date. Suffice it to say that the sanctions were imposed upon Dan Gertler (and his related companies) by the United States for his mining activities and human rights abuses in the Congo. While both the US, for formality’s sake, and Gertler and his associates now deny the allegations of abuse that triggered the imposition of the sanctions, The Africa Report, Global Witness and Bloomberg to name a few, have made direct and undeniable connections between Gertler and those abuses. They have also directly connected Gertler to Kabila and Kabila to Gertler. While they have not necessarily tied Gertler to Kabila’s reelection, or rather re-positioning of power, the connection is largely undeniable; and we maintain the whole show was being negotiated by Guiliani and/or his associates and Mer.

Dan Gertler Speaks, Sharing with the Congolese People? Really…. Part I.

#RDC #Corruption: Accusé par la justice américaine d’avoir corrompu des officiels congolais, dont Joseph Kabila, l’israélien Dan Gertler a adressé un message enregistré aux Congolais. Extrait pic.twitter.com/Jvw7o5EDD4

— Sonia Rolley (@soniarolley) November 16, 2020

We leave this to our readers to judge for yourselves.

Please, as you consider his words, keep in mind that the Congolese people have received little or nothing from Dan Gertler’s mining activities in the DRC.

Dan Gertler has had kosher food carted by private plane from Kinshasa to his locale at a cost of upwards of $20,000/day if that number still stands.

Dan Gertler has been the subject of Magnitsky Act sanctions for bad acts and conduct, not for his alleged generosity.

Judge for yourselves.

Glencore, Human Rights, Gertler, Sanctions, the DRC and The Global Magnitsky Act’s Non-Enforcement

Photograph Credit: Transparency International

Who Oversees Enforcement of The Magnitsky Act and Dan Gertler’s Payments from Glencore Belie Enforcement

DISCLAIMER: The below Euractiv.com piece is an Opinion Post, republished in part without the permission of the author or the Euractiv.com Ltd. company and/or their website.

We are re-posting with links to the original.

This current interest comes at the heals of recent violence in the DRC: “The Congolese army has arrived at Glencore’s largest copper and cobalt mine following the deaths of over 40 informal miners on the site.” (The Financial Times) “The latest tragedy struck at a site owned by Kamoto Copper Company, a subsidiary of FTSE 100 giant Glencore. The company has reported incursions of up to 2,000 people a day on its giant mining concession, which, at 5,200 acres, is difficult to secure.” (The Telegraph)

For the purposes of the Global Magnitsky Act in the US, it is unclear within the context of the United States enforcement mechanisms who enforces the Global Magnitsky Act within the branches of US Government. The Sanctions against Dan Gertler, a former partner of Glencore, were issued by the Department of Treasury and Foreign Assets (OFAC); but Glencore’s announcements in 2018 that it would pay Gertler in a currency other than US Dollars to avoid triggering the sanctions or asset seizures was announced with a measure of glee in 2018. It would seem, therefore that even though the US has enacted the Global Magnitsky Act it lacks teeth or in the alternative, those with teeth are easily bought.

“Glencore said it believed payment of the royalties in a currency other than U.S. dollars to Africa Horizons Investments Limited and Ventora without the involvement of U.S. entities would address applicable sanctions obligations. It added it had discussed the matter “with the appropriate U.S. and Swiss government agencies”. [Reuters]

Based upon Glencore’s own comments, it would appear that they colluded with US and Swiss government agencies to avoid compliance, or rather to find loopholes in which payment would comply. Either way, this means that Gertler continues to get wealthier off the backs of the Congolese people and The Magnitsky Sanctions, intended to prevent exploitation of human rights are meaningless.

We believe that there is a connection to Gertler with high ranking officials in the United States government or with people who have the ear of US officials and with that, a means of guaranteeing that those who would be overseeing the sanctions simply look the other way.

We take the general position that the are no coincidences, everything is political and nearly everyone has a price. 

DRC: ex-president Joseph Kabila’s attempt to buy Congolese banks — WiseAfri

via DRC: ex-president Joseph Kabila’s attempt to buy Congolese banks — WiseAfri

Gertler, Glencore and the DRC, why the New President Needs Decisive Action

Gertler, Dark Payments from Mining, Glencore, the IMF and President Felix Tshisekedi of the DRC

IMF, Congo Meet as President Tshisekedi Seeks Reconciliation

By

William Clowes

‎May‎ ‎23‎, ‎2019‎ ‎7‎:‎26‎ ‎AM

The International Monetary Fund arrived for its first talks with the Democratic Republic of Congo since 2015 as President Felix Tshisekedi seeks to repair relations with the Washington-based institution and fulfill a pledge to fight corruption.

Tshisekedi, who replaced Joseph Kabila after elections in December, last month told delegates while on a visit to Washington that he’d come “to untangle the dictatorial system which was in place.” He told another meeting that Congo’s endemic corruption had “discouraged serious investors.”

“We urge them to do a thorough audit at every level and not to be lenient,” Gilbert Mundela, an adviser to Tshisekedi, said in interview Thursday in the capital, Kinsasha.

Non-government organizations want the IMF to undertake “an independent audit into the management of public companies,” according to a letter addressed to Managing Director Christine Lagarde. They also called for unpublished mining contracts to be made public.

The fund halted a $532 million three-year loan program for Congo seven years ago after the government failed to publish details of a 2011 mining deal. “Opacity in the management of public companies has only increased” since the program ended, according to the letter.

Dark Deals

The local organizations singled out state-owned mining company Gecamines, saying its transactions with international investors “are done in darkness.” Advocacy groups such as the Atlanta-based Carter Center and London-based Global Witness say Gecamines failed to account for hundreds of millions of dollars paid to it by partners in copper and cobalt deals. Gecamines rejects the claims.

The 32 organizations are also “worried” about royalties paid to Israeli businessman Dan Gertler from two copper-cobalt mines controlled by Glencore Plc. The contracts enabling Gertler to acquire the royalty streams are unpublished, according to the letter.

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