Ever since US intelligence agencies accused Russia of trying to influence the US election, there have been questions about the proof they had to support the accusation.
However, the news from Moscow might explain how the agencies could be so certain that it was the Russians who hacked the e-mail of Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Rodham Clinton’s campaign and the Democratic National Committee (DNC).
Two Russian intelligence officers who worked on cyberoperations and a Russian computer security expert have been arrested and charged with treason for providing information to the US, according to multiple Russian news reports.
Photo: AP / Sputnik / Kremlin pool photo
The details made public so far are incomplete. Russian media reports link the charges to the disclosure of the Russian role in attacking US state election boards, including the scanning of voter rolls in Arizona and Illinois, and do not mention the parallel attacks on the DNC and the e-mail of Clinton’s campaign chairman.
However, one current and one former US official, speaking about the classified recruitments on condition of anonymity, confirmed that human sources in Russia did play a crucial role in proving who was responsible for the hacking.
The public disclosure of the arrests, and the severity of the treason charge, come at a delicate moment for US President Donald Trump.
He has been loath to accept the intelligence agencies’ conclusion that Russia tried to help him win, which he sees as part of an effort to delegitimize his election.
The Russian role was expected to loom over the conversation with Russian President Vladimir Putin that Trump was scheduled to have yesterday since it was the Russian president whom former US director of national security James Clapper Jr told Congress ordered the hacking and leaking.
One topic of the telephone conversation is likely to be the sanctions that former US president Barack Obama’s administration imposed on Russia, including ones that were imposed last month in retaliation for the election hacking.
The arrests, according to reports by the Russian newspapers Kommersant and Novaya Gazeta, among others, were made early last month and amounted to a purge of the cyberwing of the FSB, the main Russian intelligence and security agency.
Those arrested by the agency’s internal affairs bureau included Sergei Mikhailov, a deputy director of the Center for Information Security, and Ruslan Stoyanov, a senior researcher at a Russian computer security company, Kaspersky Lab.
ROLLER-COASTER RIDE: More than five earthquakes ranging from magnitude 4.4 to 5.5 on the Richter scale shook eastern Taiwan in rapid succession yesterday afternoon Back-to-back weather fronts are forecast to hit Taiwan this week, resulting in rain across the nation in the coming days, the Central Weather Administration said yesterday, as it also warned residents in mountainous regions to be wary of landslides and rockfalls. As the first front approached, sporadic rainfall began in central and northern parts of Taiwan yesterday, the agency said, adding that rain is forecast to intensify in those regions today, while brief showers would also affect other parts of the nation. A second weather system is forecast to arrive on Thursday, bringing additional rain to the whole nation until Sunday, it
LANDSLIDES POSSIBLE: The agency advised the public to avoid visiting mountainous regions due to more expected aftershocks and rainfall from a series of weather fronts A series of earthquakes over the past few days were likely aftershocks of the April 3 earthquake in Hualien County, with further aftershocks to be expected for up to a year, the Central Weather Administration (CWA) said yesterday. Based on the nation’s experience after the quake on Sept. 21, 1999, more aftershocks are possible over the next six months to a year, the agency said. A total of 103 earthquakes of magnitude 4 on the local magnitude scale or higher hit Hualien County from 5:08pm on Monday to 10:27am yesterday, with 27 of them exceeding magnitude 5. They included two, of magnitude
CONDITIONAL: The PRC imposes secret requirements that the funding it provides cannot be spent in states with diplomatic relations with Taiwan, Emma Reilly said China has been bribing UN officials to obtain “special benefits” and to block funding from countries that have diplomatic ties with Taiwan, a former UN employee told the British House of Commons on Tuesday. At a House of Commons Foreign Affairs Committee hearing into “international relations within the multilateral system,” former Office of the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR) employee Emma Reilly said in a written statement that “Beijing paid bribes to the two successive Presidents of the [UN] General Assembly” during the two-year negotiation of the Sustainable Development Goals. Another way China exercises influence within the UN Secretariat is
Taiwan’s first drag queen to compete on the internationally acclaimed RuPaul’s Drag Race, Nymphia Wind (妮妃雅), was on Friday crowned the “Next Drag Superstar.” Dressed in a sparkling banana dress, Nymphia Wind swept onto the stage for the final, and stole the show. “Taiwan this is for you,” she said right after show host RuPaul announced her as the winner. “To those who feel like they don’t belong, just remember to live fearlessly and to live their truth,” she said on stage. One of the frontrunners for the past 15 episodes, the 28-year-old breezed through to the final after weeks of showcasing her unique