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Politics : Bill Clinton Scandal - SANITY CHECK -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Bill who wrote (59571)	9/8/1999 12:21:00 PM
From: DMaA	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 67261

I didn't know. How was I supposed to know? Hell, the buck never got here. The search for scapegoats expandes into the Treasure,and State Departments. Officials Kept Information On Russian Probe From Gore By BOB DAVIS Staff Reporter of THE WALL STREET JOURNAL WASHINGTON -- U.S. Treasury, State Department and White House officials learned this spring of allegations of a massive Russian money-laundering operation involving Bank of New York Co., but didn't pass the information to the vice president or president.[WELL ISN'T THAT CONVENIENT] Vice President Al Gore, in particular, has been criticized by Republican presidential candidates for being "out of the loop" on the money-laundering probe, despite his position as chairman of a binational commission that oversees many aspects of U.S.-Russia relations. "If there was a loop of people, that loop was formed on the day we received a briefing" late last month, said a Gore aide. "It didn't exist before then." But senior administration officials yesterday detailed, for the first time, a series of contacts by which federal officials learned of the money-laundering probe by U.S. investigators. Treasury Was Informed in April Treasury officials learned of the existence of the investigation in April from regulators at the Federal Reserve Bank of New York. Treasury officials were told there wasn't any evidence that U.S. or International Monetary Fund resources were involved in the money laundering, a senior administration official said. See previous articles that appeared in The Wall Street Journal. The Treasury Department then relayed the information up the chain of command to then-Treasury Secretary Robert Rubin. Mr. Rubin[WHO CONCENIENTLY DOESN'T WORK THERE ANYMORE] has told former colleagues that he doesn't remember being told of the matter. But the information wasn't passed to senior White House officials because it was considered to be the province of the Justice Department, the administration official said. At the time, the Treasury was considering what conditions the IMF should insist upon to protect any future loans to Russia against theft or misuse. Treasury officials eventually developed a plan in which any IMF loans would go to pay off Russia's existing debt to the fund and wouldn't pass through Moscow. The Clinton official said that learning about the money-laundering probe didn't affect the safeguards that were sought. State Department and NSC Questions Separately, in March 1999, State Department officials learned from a foreign government that Bank of New York was being investigated. State Department officials then alerted their colleagues who work on crime and corruption issues at the White House's National Security Council. Together, the State Department and NSC officials briefed the Justice Department and Federal Bureau of Investigation on the allegations, two senior administration officials said. Neither the Justice Department nor the FBI would confirm the existence of the probe at that time, the officials said. Afterward, the Clinton officials said, State Department and NSC officials would "remind" the Justice Department and FBI of their interest. But investigators didn't tell the State Department or NSC about the probes or whether foreign-policy issues were involved. As a result, said a senior Clinton administration official, the allegations concerning money laundering and Bank of New York weren't passed on to policy officials at the White House or to the vice president's office. Administration officials make a distinction between the information provided by Fed officials or overseas contacts, and the Justice Department's formal money-laundering probe. Treasury, State and White House officials, including Mr. Gore, weren't briefed about the formal Justice Department probe until around Aug. 27. The Fed has been looking at questions of Russian money laundering for some time. In 1995, it conducted an inquiry into possible illegal banking activities by Menatep, the Russian bank that is now a focus of the money-laundering probe. That investigation included a visit to Moscow by a top Fed official and a meeting in Washington between Fed investigators and Menatep Vice Chairman Konstantin Kagalovsky, now a leading figure in the Bank of New York investigations. President Clinton plans to raise the money-laundering case with Russian Prime Minister Vladimir Putin when the two meet this weekend at an economic summit in New Zealand. Mr. Clinton wants to assure the Russians that the probe isn't being driven by U.S. domestic politics, said a U.S. official, and emphasize U.S. concerns that international loans and aid not be abused. Investigators are looking at whether IMF loans were improperly diverted into offshore accounts. "The president has always been concerned with issues of crime and corruption in Russia, and has raised that in his meetings with Russian officials," said White House spokesman Joe Lockhart.