Businessman financed Russian spy

Maria Butina, a Russian citizen accused of attempting to infiltrate political organizations in the United States, received financial support from a Russian businessman linked to companies energy and technology in the United States, according to a report released today. The Washington Post .

Butina, 29, was arrested last weekend for trying to influence groups such as the National Rifle Association (NRA)

. After being considered a "risk of extreme escape", she remains detained without bail pending trial.

Last April, the Russian citizen told the Senate Committee that Konstantin Nikolaev, a Russian businessman, had provided funds. for a right-wing group that defends possession of weapons that she represented, according to the newspaper.

A spokesman for Nikolaev said that the Washington Post The businessman did indeed have contact with Butina, but refused to confirm when he told him had offered money.

The investigators say that Maria Butina worked for years as an undercover agent with the intention of "promoting the interests of her country of origin". ] Judicial authorities said last week that Butina began a romantic relationship with an American person who had access to "a vast network" of other influential Americans.

According to prosecutors, Butina, a graduate student, was working in the United States under the direction of an unidentified Russian government official, who was seeking to establish lines of communication "on the back" and that the woman was in contact with Russian agents during her stay in this country.

through the port and rail companies in Russia, but also part of the board of directors of a Houston-based ethane company, called American Ethane.

This company was greeted by President Donald Trump at an event in China last year for a trade deal aimed at providing liquid ethane in Beijing.

HE MEETS WITH OFFICIALS OF THE EDF AND TREASURE

On the other hand, yesterday it was revealed that Maria Butina had high-level contacts in Washington that what was previously known, participating in 2015 in meetings between a Russian Official Visit and two Federal Reserve System (FED) authorities and the United States Treasury Department.

The meetings, revealed by several people familiar with the sessions and a report from a group of Washington experts he organized, they involved Stanley Fischer, vice president of the Fed at that time , and Nathan Sheets, then under-secretary of the US Treasury for International Affairs.

Butina traveled to Estates. Joined in April 2015 with Alexander Torshin, then Deputy Governor of the Central Bank of Russia