UPDATE: VK is more than just "Russian Facebook." Rosneft CEO and Putin ally Igor Sechin is one of two men who control it. The site cooperates with the FSB, Russia's Federal Security Service. And Ukraine banned VK in May in an effort to crack down on Russian spying.
CNN reports exclusively that the June 9, 2016 Trump Tower meeting between Donald Trump Jr., Russian lawyer Natalia Veselnitskaya, and six others did not end there. Newly revealed emails show multiple examples of follow-up correspondence.
The first of note is between British publicist Rob Goldstone, meeting organizer and attendee, and someone on the Trump campaign:
The emails from the publicist, Rob Goldstone, were discovered by congressional investigators and raised at Wednesday's classified hearing with Trump Jr., who said he could not recall the interactions, several sources said. None of the newly disclosed emails were sent directly to Trump Jr....
An email from Goldstone to senior Trump aide Dan Scavino, now the White House director of social media, reveals a previously undisclosed topic that was discussed at the meeting. It encourages Scavino to get candidate Trump to create a page on the Russian social networking site VK, telling him that "Don and Paul" were on board with the idea -- a reference to then-Trump campaign chairman Paul Manafort and Trump Jr.
(...)
A source familiar with the matter says Goldstone did not talk about the meeting with Trump Jr. after they left Trump Tower. Trump Jr. has said he did not follow up on the meeting.
Another email shows Goldstone, shortly after the June 9th meeting, forwarded news about the DNC hack to his client and a meeting attendee with a curious comment attached:
In one email dated June 14, 2016, Goldstone forwarded a CNN story on Russia's hacking of DNC emails to his client, Russian pop star Emin Agalarov, and Ike Kaveladze, a Russian who attended the meeting along with Trump Jr., Trump's son-in-law Jared Kushner and Manafort, describing the news as "eerily weird" given what they had discussed at Trump Tower five days earlier.
And yet another email, this one from Ike Kaveladze's son to his dad, raises more questions:
When Trump Jr. posted his full email exchange with Goldstone on Twitter showing he was promised the meeting would produce dirt on the Clinton campaign, George Kaveladze emailed his father asking why Trump Jr. was admitting "collusion"...
Trump Jr. repeatedly has denied any follow-up to the meeting every took place.
Trump Jr. was asked about these emails during his classified interview Wednesday, though he said he was not aware of them or could not recall the contents, sources said.
In his statement to the Senate Judiciary Committee in September, Trump Jr. said the meeting was only 20 to 30 minutes and "Rob, Emin and I never discussed the meeting again. I do not recall ever discussing it with Jared, Paul or anyone else. In short, I gave it no further thought."
House and Senate investigators expect to speak with Goldstone behind closed doors in the coming weeks.
Full story: Exclusive: Previously undisclosed emails show follow-up after Trump Tower meeting (CNN)
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Russia's VKontakte CEO says he was fired, flees Russia (Reuters)
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