Paul Manafort, the former key adviser to fugitive ex-Ukrainian President Viktor Yanukovych and campaign manager to U. S. President Donald J. Trump, received $1.2 million out of the alleged $12.7 million in payments on the Yanukovych-led Party of Region’s black ledger, the Associated Press confirmed this week.
The revelation came amid a statement from Manafort’s spokesman, Jason Maloni, indicating that the political adviser would file as a foreign agent with the U. S. Justice Department retroactively.
The Podesta Group, run by Anthony Podesta — the brother of Hillary Clinton campaign manager John Podesta — separately filed as a foreign agent for representing the European Center for a Modern Ukraine until April 2014.
Podesta wrote in a filing under the U. S. Foreign Agents Registration Act — which mandates that lobbyists acting on behalf of foreign governments or political parties in the United States disclose details about their work — that he never had “any direct knowledge” of the center’s “source of funding.”
The center’s stated goal was “enhancing European Union-Ukraine relations,” although 2014 media reports allege that the organization acted as the Party of Region’s Washington, D.C., lobbyist.
Ina Kirsch, the group’s former executive director, did not reply to a request for comment.
Manafort has not yet filed his declaration under the law. His spokesman, Meloni, did not reply to a request for comment asking when the filing would take place.
Manafort loan
The New York Times reported in a separate story that Manafort received $13 million in loans in the month after he stepped down as chairman of the Trump campaign on Aug. 19.
One of the loans, worth $3.5 million, came from a New York investment fund’s private lending division. The fund, called Spruce Capital, appears to have secured the loan against a Hamptons property that belongs to Manafort.
Spruce Capital has its own Ukraine connection. Mukacheve-born fertilizer and real estate billionaire Alexander Rovt is a financial backer of the group, which focuses on property acquisitions in and near New York City.
Rovt, a longtime backer of Democratic candidates including a February 2016 donation of $2,700 to Hillary Clinton, appears to have hedged his bets on Election Day, giving $10,000 to the Trump campaign on Nov. 8.
Rovt denied to the New York Times that he knew Manafort.
Rovt’s company, IBE Trade Corp., controlled a number of fertilizer production centers in Ukraine before selling a portion of them off to Ostchem, a company controlled by exiled Ukrainian oligarch Dmytro Firtash, who faces corruption charges in the United States.
IBE Trade Corp. was one of the companies interested in acquiring the Odesa Portside Plant last year. Rovt said in a December statement, however, that the company “declined” to purchase it, citing low commodities prices.
Rovt joined Ukrainian member of parliament Andrii Artemenko on a February 2016 panel on Ukrainian politics, held in New York City. Artemenko did not reply to a question on how he first met Rovt.
Manafort is under investigation by U.S. federal law enforcement over allegedly failing to file as a foreign agent while working for Yanukovych and is reportedly a subject of a separate FBI probe into Russian interference into the 2016 U.S. election. Manafort denies any wrongdoing.
