“New evidence reinforces the suspicion that Russia was behind the downed MH17 plane,” editorial, The Washington Post, May 4 (https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/global-opinions/the-mh17-evidence-points-to-russia-how-much-longer-will-putin-deny-it/2020/05/04/7b2655f2-8bd5-11ea-ac8a-fe9b8088e101_story.html):
…Russia has for several years insisted it did not shoot down MH17. The Kremlin tried all manner of tricks to lay the blame on Ukraine. The body of evidence, however, clearly points to Russia, and now a new piece of evidence reinforces that suspicion. The open-source investigative group Bellingcat, along with its Russian partner the Insider and the McClatchy Washington Bureau, reports that a high-ranking official of the Russian Federal Security Service, or FSB, oversaw the separatists and deployment of the missile. They have identified him as Col. Gen. Andrey Ivanovich Burlaka, chief of the operational staff of the FSB’s Border Service and one of the most senior officers in the FSB…
The international investigators and Bellingcat have scrutinized intercepted telephone conversations during the period before and after the shoot-down. Over and over again, they heard reference to a shadowy FSB officer, “Vladimir Ivanovich.” According to Bellingcat, the officer at the start of July 2014 “was already in a crucial role supervising militant activities” in the separatist region “and authorizing the flow of weapons across the border.”…
The findings suggest President Vladimir Putin’s regime was overseeing the separatists at the time the Russian missile was fired at the airliner.
Mr. Putin, a former director of the FSB, surely knows exactly what happened. Yet when asked two years ago whether a Russian missile could have destroyed the plane, Mr. Putin said, “Of course not.” How much longer will Russia continue to deny that it bears responsibility for this awful crime?
No, there’s still no Biden-Ukraine scandal,” editorial, The Washington Post, May 23 (https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/no-theres-still-no-biden-ukraine-scandal/2020/05/22/628ce78e-9c5d-11ea-ad09-8da7ec214672_story.html):
…Out of Ukraine this week came audio recordings that have every appearance of a Kremlin scheme to tar presumptive Democratic nominee Joe Biden. The president’s son, Donald Trump Jr., who welcomed Russian aid against Hillary Clinton in 2016, tweeted them out and implied they were damning – though in fact there is absolutely nothing damning about them.…
The recordings came from Andriy Derkach, a Ukrainian lawmaker connected to the Russian intelligence services. Mr. Derkach said they show that Mr. Biden in 2015 pressured then-Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko to help Burisma, a Ukrainian natural gas company, in return for U.S. aid. Mr. Biden’s son Hunter was on Burisma’s board.
In fact, nowhere in the highly edited audio files does Mr. Biden discuss Burisma or his son. Rather, they show that Mr. Biden linked U.S. loan guarantees to the firing of Ukraine’s corrupt prosecutor general, Viktor Shokin, which was an avowed aim of U.S. and European foreign policy. Mr. Biden himself revealed in 2018 his role in Mr. Shokin’s ouster, which was a legitimate condition for U.S. aid. The audio reveals nothing new, and certainly nothing scandalous, about Mr. Biden.…
For his part, Ukraine’s current president, Volodymyr Zelensky, said the conversations “might be perceived, qualified as high treason.” His ire was focused not on Mr. Biden but on Mr. Poroshenko, a political rival. Though he likely had domestic politics in mind, Mr. Zelensky should be wary of abetting a baseless partisan campaign against Mr. Biden, which would endanger long-term relations between Ukraine and the United States.…