A close friend to the President’s troubled son Hunter has been arrested in Kazakhstan. Former intelligence chief Karim Massimo was arrested by Kazakh authorities last week on alleged suspicion of high treason.
Breaking: this photo appears to have been taken at Cafe Milano showing then VP Joe Biden with two Kazakhstani guests from Hunter's 2015 dinner to introduce his clients to dad. L-R – oligarch Kenes Rakishev, Hunter, Joe, PM Karim Massimov https://t.co/ywWPhL3T3f pic.twitter.com/WO5xAVOH02
— Miranda Devine (@mirandadevine) May 28, 2021
The Washington Examiner reports:
Massimov’s arrest came Thursday, one day after he was fired from his post as chairman of the Kazakhstan National Security Committee. He was arrested amid nationwide violent protests sparked by, among other things, an increase in fuel prices. The unrest has resulted in thousands of arrests and dozens of deaths.
Hunter Biden, while serving on the board of the Ukrainian energy company Burisma, shared a close business relationship with Massimov during his second stint as Kazakhstan’s prime minister from 2014 through 2016, according to records from Hunter Biden’s laptop.
Emails and texts from the laptop previously reported by the Washington Examiner show that Hunter Biden scheduled a meeting in 2014 with Massimov in Kazakhstan to discuss an energy deal with Burisma. Hunter Biden ditched his Secret Service security detail before departing from Paris to Kazakhstan to discuss the deal, the records show.
Until last week, Massimov led Kazakhstan’s National Security Committee, an intelligence and security agency that replaced the Soviet-era KGB in 1992 after the collapse and dissolution of the USSR. An announcement from the agency on Saturday said he had been arrested on Thursday after being removed the day before.