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Sabtu, 27 April 2019

Putin: Maria Butina's sentence is 'lawlessness' - NBC News

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April 27, 2019, 11:52 AM UTC

By Yuliya Talmazan

An 18-month sentence for Maria Butina, a Russian operative who used her NRA activism to illegally infiltrate conservative political circles, was an effort to "save face" for the U.S., Russian President Vladimir Putin said Saturday.

Speaking with reporters after an international forum in Beijing, Putin said there was nothing to charge Butina with.

"It's not clear what she was sentenced for," the Russian president said. "What crime did she commit?

Butina was sentenced to 18 months in prison by a federal judge Friday.

Maria ButinaAlexandria Sheriff's Office

The 30-year-old American University graduate student pleaded guilty in December to one count of conspiracy to violate the law governing foreign agents operating in the U.S. She was arrested in July.

U.S. District Judge Tanya Chutkan gave Butina credit for nine months of time served. The judge ordered her deported as soon as her time is up.

On Saturday, Putin said he agreed with his Foreign Ministry's assessment that Butina's sentence is "lawlessness."

"I think it's a case of 'saving face'," the Russian president said, adding: "In order to not make it look completely ridiculous, they gave her 18 months to show that she's guilty of something."

On Friday, Butina addressed the court and, her voice at times quivering, insisted she wasn't working as a spy, and that she only wanted to mend Russia-U.S. relations.

"I came here to better my life to get a degree. I wished to mend relations while building my resume," she said. "It was for these actions and my own ignorance that I’m here."

However, she admitted to harming relations between the two superpowers.

"It has never been my intention to harm American people, but I did so by not notifying your government. It has harmed my attempts to improve relations," she said. “I have three degrees, but now I’m a convicted felon with no money, no job and no freedom.”

“Instead of building peace, I created discord,” she said.

But Chutkan didn't buy Butina's tearful claims of innocent ignorance of the law, saying the Russian operative knew exactly what she was doing.

"She was doing this under the direction of a Russian official ... at a time that Russia was looking to interfere with the U.S. political process," the judge said. “This was no simple misunderstanding by an overeager foreign student."

Russian state media news service TASS reported that the Russian Foreign Ministry called the verdict an "ugly stain" on the U.S. justice system, adding that the court decision was "politically motivated."

The ministry had for months called Butina "a political prisoner" and started a hashtag #FreeMariaButina campaign in her support.

Maria Butina's sentencing before judge Tanya ChutkanArt Lien

Her defense lawyers had asked Chutkan for no jail time, writing in a sentencing memo that Butina has "always been willing to cooperate with the government."

Prosecutors conceded that "Butina was not a spy in the traditional sense," but said she was still working to the detriment of the United States.

Yuliya Talmazan

Yuliya Talmazan is a London-based journalist.

David K. Li and Charlie Gile contributed.

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https://www.nbcnews.com/news/world/putin-maria-butina-s-sentence-lawlessness-n999146

2019-04-27 11:52:00Z
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Sri Lankan forces discover over a dozen bodies, including children, at ISIS safe house - Fox News

Sri Lankan police and army soldiers secure the site after an explosion and a gunbattle in Kalmunai, eastern Sri Lanka Saturday, April 27, 2019. (Associated Press)

As Sri Lankan security forces raided an ISIS safe house late Friday into Saturday morning, militants open fired and detonated at least three suicide bombs, killing 15 people, including six children. The dead were found charred, others had their clothes burned off of their bodies.

Police tipped off soldiers about a suspected safe house in the town of Sammanthurai as part of a widespread search operation for militants with explosives believed to still be at large after the coordinated bombings of churches and luxury hotels that killed more than 250 nearly a week ago.

US RAISES TRAVEL WARNING AFTER SRI LANKA SUICIDE BOMBINGS

The military also issued curfews for civilians, and Roman Catholic churches have canceled Masses indefinitely. Authorities told Muslims to worship at home rather than attend communal Friday prayers that are the most important religious service of the week, but several mosques held services anyway.

Police spokesman Ruwan Gunasekara said that some of the dead found at the safe house were militants who blew themselves up. Earlier, the military said at least one civilian had been killed in the attack. At least two people, a woman and a girl, survived the gunbattle and bombing episode and were being treated at a hospital for serious injuries.

During the sweeping raids, military officials said security forces discovered explosives, detonators, "suicide kits," military uniforms and Islamic State group flags. It was not clear whether these items were found at the same safe house or elsewhere.

Gunasekara said officers acting on information from intelligence officials also found 150 sticks of blasting gelatin and 100,000 small metal balls, as well as a van and clothing suspected of being used by those involved in the Easter attacks. Suicide bomb vests often are packed with such balls to increase the shrapnel in the explosion, making them even deadlier.

Fear of more attacks has led to increased security at shrines, churches, temples and mosques across the multiethnic country of 21 million off the southern coast of India.

Sri Lanka's government, crippled from a long political crisis between the president and prime minister last year, promised swift action to capture militants still at large. President Maithripala Sirisena said about 140 people had been identified as having links to the Islamic State group.

A "major search operation has been undertaken," Sirisena said. "Every household in the country will be checked."

Cardinal Malcolm Ranjith told reporters Friday that church officials had seen a leaked security document describing Roman Catholic churches and other denominations as a major target. Ranjith, who is the archbishop of Colombo, asked the faithful across Sri Lanka to stay home for their own safety.

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On Friday, police confirmed the militant group's leader, Mohamed Zahran, died in the suicide bombing at the Shangri-La Hotel, one of six hotels and churches attacked. Zahran appeared in an Islamic State video claiming responsibility for the coordinated assault, and authorities in both Sri Lanka and Australia confirmed links between IS and the attack.

On Thursday night, Sri Lanka's Health Ministry drastically reduced its estimated death toll from the bombings. A statement said "approximately" 253 people had been killed, nearly one-third lower than an earlier police estimate of 359 dead.

The Associated Press contributed to this report.

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https://www.foxnews.com/world/sri-lankan-forces-discover-dozen-bodies-ichildren-isis-safe-house

2019-04-27 09:50:09Z
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Sri Lanka Says 15 Died in Raid, Including 4 Suicide Bombers - The New York Times

COLOMBO, Sri Lanka — Sri Lankan security forces said they found the bodies of 15 people, including four suicide bombers who had detonated their explosives, in a house on Saturday morning, hours after a gun battle erupted as they raided it in search of suspects linked to the Easter Sunday bombings.

Brig. Sumith Atapattu, a spokesman for the Sri Lankan military, said six children were among the dead, the four bombers had blown themselves up as security forces closed in on the house around midnight, and one of the dead had been killed in the gun battle with security forces.

The house, in a town on Sri Lanka’s east coast, was cordoned off after the overnight raid, but security forces waited until dawn to search it because it is in a crowded neighborhood.

Brigadier Atapattu said it was “too early to tell” whether the house was directly linked to the group that carried out the coordinated bombings on Sunday at churches, luxury hotels and other sites in Sri Lanka, killing more than 250 people.

The house is in a village called Bolivarian, part of the densely populated, mostly Muslim town of Sainthamaruthu. It is about 25 miles from Batticaloa, where one of the church bombings took place.

A man who lives in the area said members of the local mosque federation, to which he belongs, had become suspicious about the tenants in the house, which he said was twice the size of many others in the area. He said two members of the federation asked the tenants to identify themselves on Friday afternoon. The tenants said they did not have identification with them, but promised to provide it the next day, he said.

Soldiers evacuated a child on Saturday in the aftermath of a raid on a house on Sri Lanka’s east coast.CreditAgence France-Presse — Getty Images

Members of the mosque federation returned in the evening with a local official, said the man, who asked not to be identified because he feared for his safety. As they approached the house from the back, the first explosion occurred, said the man, adding that the bombers might have suspected that someone was coming for them.

The man, who was at home when the first blast happened, said he then heard continuous gunfire and another explosion. He saw people running, including a police constable. About 30 minutes later, he said, security personnel arrived in force.

Another house a few miles away was also raided on Friday. The army said troops there found Islamic State flags, suicide kits, military uniforms and explosives with detonators.

The raids began just hours after President Maithripala Sirisena promised a house-to-house search of the entire country and a “total reorganization” of Sri Lanka’s security apparatus. His government is under enormous pressure for failing to act on repeated warnings that attacks on churches were being planned.

“Every household in the country will be checked,” Mr. Sirisena said in a meeting on Friday, according to a statement released by his office. “The lists of permanent residents of every house will be established to ensure no unknown persons could live anywhere.”

Frustration and fear have continued to grip Sri Lanka since the Easter bombings, particularly in the capital, Colombo, as officials have warned that other potential bombers could still be on the run and plotting attacks.

Sri Lankan security officials wrote a memo 10 days before the bombings warning that attacks were being planned, including names, addresses and phone numbers of people believed to be involved, but the president and prime minister have said the memo never reached them. Foreign intelligence agencies had repeatedly warned that attacks were being planned, with one such warning coming just hours before the bombings.

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https://www.nytimes.com/2019/04/27/world/asia/sri-lanka-bombings.html

2019-04-27 09:17:32Z
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Sri Lanka bombings: 15 die in blast during raid on suspected hideout - BBC News

The bodies of 15 people including six children were found after an explosion at a suspected Islamist militant hideout in east Sri Lanka, police said.

Police said the dead also included three women, believed to be family members of the suspected militants.

Residents said they heard an explosion followed by gunfire over several hours.

The clashes took place in Sainthamaruthu, not far from the home town of the suspected ringleader of the Easter Sunday suicide attacks.

Around the same time, security forces raided another building in a nearby town where they said they found explosives and a drone.

Sri Lanka has been on high alert since a co-ordinated wave of bombings last Sunday killed at least 250 people and wounded more than 500.

The bombings targeted churches which were packed full for the Easter holiday, as well as hotels popular with tourists.

Sri Lankan authorities blamed a local Islamist extremist group, National Tawheed Jamath, for the attacks, although the Islamic State group (IS) has also claimed it played a role.

Security forces have carried out raids across the country since the attacks, but officials say there are dozen of Islamic State sympathisers still at large in the country.

How did the raid unfold?

Police said the raid on Friday followed a tip-off about a location in a Muslim majority town of Ampara Sainthamaruthu, near Batticaloa.

An armed group at the location set off an explosion and a gun battle ensued, police said.

When troops moved in after dawn on Saturday they found 15 bodies in the burnt-out building, believed to be those of the suspected gunmen and family members, but also some civilians caught in the crossfire, police said.

The area is not far from the home town of radical preacher Zahran Hashim, the suspected ringleader of the attacks, who is said to have died in one of the bombings on Sunday.

In another raid in the same town, IS flags, 150 sticks of gelignite explosive, thousands of steel pellets and a drone camera were found, a military spokesman said.

According to local media reports, 10 arrests were made across the country on Friday, bringing the total number detained since last Sunday to 80.

President Maithripala Sirisena has told reporters that intelligence services believed about 130 suspects linked to IS were in the country and that police were hunting 70 still at large.

Bomber 'sat, ate, and waited'

The manager of one of the Colombo hotels targeted by a suicide bomber last Sunday described to the BBC the moments leading up to the attack.

Rohan Karr said the suspected bomber checked into the Cinnamon Grand hotel the evening before, was served a welcome drink and then went up to his room.

"He came down in the morning with the rucksack on his back and he went into the restaurant. He made sure he got a table right in the middle of the restaurant and he was walking around with the rucksack on his back.

"We never thought this was the man who going to kill us.

"He sat, he ate, he waited for people to gather towards the buffet. When he saw a bigger crowd that was the time he decided, this is the time for me to create maximum damage."

How has the Catholic Church responded?

The Catholic Church in Sri Lanka has cancelled all Sunday Masses until further notice. Archbishop of Colombo Malcolm Ranjith said he had seen a leaked security document warning of further attacks.

Cardinal Ranjith said that the Church had not been told about intelligence warnings of possible attacks. "We didn't know anything. It came as a thunderbolt for us," he told reporters.

Asked about the warnings, he said: "I felt betrayed a little bit. I felt sad. It's a very serious lapse on the part of the security agencies that they didn't tell us about it."

He said the church would halt all services until further notice, and urged parishioners to instead "stay indoors and do their prayers".

Security was stepped up around mosques for Friday prayers, while some Muslims stayed away, fearing revenge attacks.

What is the political fallout?

Sri Lanka's police chief and top defence ministry official both resigned over the bombings.

But Sri Lanka's Prime Minister Ranil Wickremesinghe said that crucial intelligence warnings had not been passed on to him. He argued that as he had not been aware of the warnings, he did not need to step down from his position.

"If we had any inkling, and we had not taken action, I would have handed in my resignation immediately," he said, adding: "But what do you do when you are out of the loop?"

The breakdown in communication has refocused attention on the infighting between the country's two most powerful men - Mr Wickremesinghe and President Maithripala Sirisena.

Relations between the two deteriorated to such an extent that last October, Mr Sirisena sacked Mr Wickremesinghe. He was reinstated in December following rulings by Sri Lanka's highest courts.

Who were the attackers?

Nine people are suspected of carrying out the attacks. President Sirisena confirmed that the alleged ringleader, Zahran Hashim, died in the attack at the Shangri-La hotel in the capital, Colombo.

Two of the bombers are said to have been the sons of spice trader Mohammad Yusuf Ibrahim, one of Sri Lanka's richest men. Mr Ibrahim was detained and questioned after the attacks.

One of his sons was reportedly the second bomber at the Shangri-La hotel alongside Zahran Hashim. The other son reportedly targeted the restaurant at the high-end Cinnamon Grand hotel, a short distance away.

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https://www.bbc.com/news/world-asia-48074702

2019-04-27 07:07:30Z
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Jumat, 26 April 2019

American Student Misidentified as Sri Lanka Suspect Faces Backlash - The New York Times

An American university student found herself caught up in a terror investigation on the other side of the world this week after Sri Lankan authorities mistakenly posted her picture with a list of potential suspects in the Easter Sunday attacks that killed more than 250 people.

The student, Amara Majeed, who attends Brown University in Rhode Island, posted on Facebook on Thursday that her photo was included in an alert issued by Sri Lanka’s Criminal Investigation Department. The public notice urged people to report any details about the potential suspects to authorities. It featured Ms. Majeed’s photo alongside the name Fathima Qadiya, who officials say is wanted in connection with the attacks.

“I have this morning been FALSELY identified by the Sri Lankan government as one of the ISIS Easter attackers in Sri Lanka,” Ms. Majeed wrote in the Facebook post. “What a thing to wake up to! This is obviously completely false and frankly, considering that Muslim communities are already greatly afflicted with issues of surveillance, I don’t need more false accusations and scrutiny.”

Ms. Majeed, a prominent United States-based Muslim activist, is the daughter of Sri Lankan immigrants. Her activism has been lauded by media organizations around the world. Ms. Majeed has been an outspoken advocate for the American Muslim community, and in 2014 wrote a book titled “The Foreigners,” to quash stereotypes about Islam.

While still in high school, she launched the Hijab Project, which encouraged women to wear a hijab for a day and write about their experiences to combat discrimination. In 2016, she wrote an open letter to Donald Trump Jr. after he compared refugees to Skittles.

Ms. Majeed was alerted to the presence of her photo in the police communication by relatives living in Sri Lanka. Officials later retracted her image from the suspect list, saying it was a mistake, but offered no apology or explanation for the situation. The Criminal Investigation Department said it was still looking for Ms. Qadiya but that the photo was not of her.

Since posting about the incident on Facebook, Ms. Majeed has drawn both support and vitriol from Sri Lankans. Her post has been viewed thousands of times and has drawn hundreds of comments. Some have hurled anti-Muslim slurs at her, claiming that she is aligned with Islamic State extremists, despite the police admission that her photo was incorrectly associated with the suspect list.

The Muslim community has faced a backlash in Sri Lanka after the Islamic State claimed responsibility for the attacks. Reports of mob attacks and violence against Muslims — a minority group in the country — have emerged in the wake of the Easter attacks.

Ms. Majeed’s Facebook post included a plea for Sri Lankan authorities to be more diligent before posting information about suspects.

“Please stop implicating and associating me with these horrific attacks,” she wrote. “And next time, be more diligent about releasing such information that has the potential to deeply violate someone’s family and community.”

The misidentification of Ms. Majeed as a potential suspect was just one of a series of errors made by authorities in recent days. First, they ignored warnings that an attack was coming. Then, on Thursday, the death toll was revised down by more than 100, after authorities said an earlier figure of more than 350 victims was inaccurate.

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https://www.nytimes.com/2019/04/26/world/asia/sri-lanka-brown-student.html

2019-04-26 16:53:37Z
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Alleged Russian agent Maria Butina sentenced to 18 months in prison on conspiracy charge - CNN

She is the first Russian citizen convicted of crimes relating to the 2016 election, though her efforts to infiltrate Republican circles appeared to be separate from the Kremlin's sweeping election-meddling campaign detailed in special counsel Robert Mueller's report.

The 30-year-old gun rights enthusiast has been incarcerated since her arrest in July and will receive credit for the nine months previously served. She will be deported to Russia after serving her sentence.

"This was no simple misunderstanding by an overeager foreign student," Judge Tanya Chutkan said.

Chutkan said that Butina, who studied at American University in Washington, engaged in work on behalf of a Russian official that was "sophisticated" and "dangerous."

"The conduct was sophisticated and penetrated deep into political organizations," Chutkan said, siding with the government's sentencing recommendation and noting that Butina's actions took place as Russia was actively trying to interfere in the US democratic process.

Butina spoke for five minutes at Friday's hearing, her voice at times breaking, as she expressed regret for her crime and asked for forgiveness.

"I deeply regret this crime," Butina said. "Ironically it has harmed my attempts to improve relationships between the two countries."

"I came to the US not under orders but with hope," Butina said. "I sought to build bridges between my motherland and the country that I grew to love."

"Never did I wish to hurt anyone," Butina said.

While prosecutors have admitted that Butina is not a spy in the traditional sense, they argued that her crime still could have jeopardized national security.

How the case against Maria Butina began to crumble

Butina pleaded guilty in December to one count of conspiracy to act as an agent of a foreign official. She admitted to using her contacts in GOP political circles, in the National Rifle Association and at the National Prayer Breakfast to influence US relations with Russia.

As part of her plea deal, Butina has cooperated extensively with the government. A source familiar with the situation said she primarily provided information about her boyfriend, GOP political operative Paul Erickson, who was allegedly involved in her scheme.

So far, Erickson has not faced charges in DC. Erickson was indicted in February on wire fraud and money laundering charges in a separate case in South Dakota. He pleaded not guilty to the federal charges.

'I still hold a whisper in my heart to one day return'

Prosecutors Friday brought a former senior FBI counterintelligence official to court who was prepared to testify about how Butina's actions posed "serious potential harm to the US."

The official, Robert Anderson, did not speak at the hearing but Chutkan made multiple references to a sworn affidavit he had submitted as she weighed the gravity of Butina's dealings.

An assistant US attorney, Erik Kenerson, said Butina worked with a Russian official as a "conduit" to send information to the Russian government, and listed several examples that the defense had not disputed of her reports, including a list of potential US secretary of state nominees she had sent back.

Kenerson also described how Butina would organize dinners with influential Americans to practice and "adjust her pitch" to draw out useful information.

Alfred Carry, one of Butina's attorneys, downplayed the significance of the dinners that Butina had organized.

"They were cultural exchanges" where people including artists and philanthropists gathered and "talked about peace," he said.

He said Butina, before her arrest, had planned to stay in the US and act as a "go-to consultant" on issues between the country and Russia.

In her statement to the court, Butina repeated those desires and said, "I still hold a whisper in my heart to one day return to this country, but I know this wish is only a dream."

CNN's Marshall Cohen contributed to this report.

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https://www.cnn.com/2019/04/26/politics/maria-butina-sentencing/index.html

2019-04-26 16:17:00Z
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Alleged Russian agent Maria Butina sentenced to 18 months in prison on conspiracy charge - CNN

"This was no simple misunderstanding by an overeager foreign student," Judge Tanya Chutkan said.

Chutkan said that Butina, who studied at American University in Washington, engaged in work on behalf of a Russian official that was "sophisticated" and "dangerous."

Butina spoke for five minutes at Friday's hearing, her voice at times breaking, as she expressed regret for her crime and asked for forgiveness.

"I deeply regret this crime," Butina said. "Ironically it has harmed my attempts to improve relationships between the two countries."

"I came to the US not under orders but with hope," Butina said. "I sought to build bridges between my motherland and the country that I grew to love."

"Never did I wish to hurt anyone," Butina said.

While prosecutors have admitted that Butina is not a spy in the traditional sense, they argued that her crime still could have jeopardized national security.

'I still hold a whisper in my heart to one day return'

Prosecutors Friday brought a former senior FBI counterintelligence official to court who was prepared to testify about how Butina's actions posed "serious potential harm to the US."

The official, Robert Anderson, did not speak at the hearing but Chutkan made multiple references to a sworn affidavit he had submitted as she weighed the gravity of Butina's dealings.

Kenerson also described how Butina would organize dinners with influential Americans to practice and "adjust her pitch" to draw out useful information.

Alfred Carry, one of Butina's attorneys, downplayed the significance of the dinners that Butina had organized.

"They were cultural exchanges" where people including artists and philanthropists gathered and "talked about peace," he said.

He said Butina, before her arrest, had planned to stay in the US and act as a "go-to consultant" on issues between the country and Russia.

In her statement to the court, Butina repeated those desires and said, "I still hold a whisper in my heart to one day return to this country, but I know this wish is only a dream."

CNN's Marshall Cohen contributed to this report.

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https://www.cnn.com/2019/04/26/politics/maria-butina-sentencing/index.html

2019-04-26 16:12:00Z
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