#russian consulate

[andrevascreencaps]

Russian Consulate

[jtownraindancer]

Tried to finish watching Geurnica and uh...

Suffice to say I have failed spectacularly.

[luckyonexcel]

Unlocking Russia Visa for Indians | A Comprehensive Guide

When contemplating international travel, one of the paramount considerations for Indian travellers is securing a Russia visa for Indians. The labyrinthine world of visa applications can appear intimidating, but fret not. This guide is designed to demystify the process and furnish you with the indispensable information you require. Whether your intentions involve a leisurely vacation, a business…

[molfarua]

❗In Rio de Janeiro, an employee of the 💩russian consulate attacked a russian woman who came to protest against the war in Ukraine.

❗У Ріо-де-Жанейро співробітник 💩російського консульства напав на росіянку, яка прийшла висловити протест проти війни в Україні.

[fdelopera]

America owes its independence to Haym Salomon, a Sephardic Jewish Patriot

A Jewish American Hero

by Yosef Kaufmann

October 17, 1781. An eerie silence takes hold over the battlefield outside Yorktown, Virginia. After weeks of non-stop artillery shells and rifle fire, the rhythmic pounding of a drum is all that is heard. Through the wispy smoke that floats above the battlefield, a British officer can be seen waving a white flag. General Cornwallis has surrendered Yorktown, ending the last major battle of the American Revolution. The surrender of Yorktown and the nearly 8,000 British troops convinced the British Parliament to start negotiating an end to the war. On September 3, 1783, the treaty of Paris was signed. The war was over.

If not for Haym Salomon, however, the decisive victory at Yorktown never would have happened.

Haym Salomon was born in Leszno, Poland, in 1740. In 1770, he was forced to leave Poland for London as a result of the Partition of Poland. Five years later, he left London for New York City, where he quickly established himself as a broker for international merchants.

Sympathetic to the Patriot cause, Haym joined the New York branch of the Sons of Liberty, a secret society that did what it could to undermine British interests in the colonies. In 1776, he was arrested by the British and charged with being a spy. He was pardoned on condition that he spend 18 months on a British ship serving as a translator for the Hessian mercenaries, as he was fluent in Polish, French, German, Russian, Spanish and Italian. During those 18 months, Haym used his position to help countless American prisoners escape. He also convinced many Hessian soldiers to abandon the British and join the American forces.

In 1778, he was arrested again and sentenced to death for his involvement in a plot to burn the British Royal fleet in the New York Harbour. He was sent to Provost to await execution, but he managed to bribe a guard and escape under the cover of darkness.

He fled New York, which was under the control of the British army, and moved to Philadelphia, the capital of the Revolution.

He borrowed money and started a business as a dealer of bills of exchange. His office was located near a coffee house frequented by the command of the American forces. He also became the agent to the French consul and the paymaster for the French forces in North America. Here he became friendly with Robert Morris, the newly appointed Superintendent of Finance for the 13 colonies. Records show that between 1781 and 1784, through both fundraising and personal loans, he was responsible for financing George Washington over $650,000, today worth approximately over $13 million.

By 1781, the American congress was practically broke. The huge cost of financing the war effort had taken its toll. In September of that year, George Washington decided to march on Yorktown to engage General Cornwallis. A huge French fleet was on its way from the West Indies under the command of Comte De Grasse. The fleet would only be able to stay until late October, so Washington was facing immense pressure to lead an attack on Yorktown before then.

After marching through Pennsylvania, with little in the way of food and supplies, Washington’s troops were on the verge of mutiny. They demanded a full month's pay in coins, not congressional paper money which was virtually worthless, or they would not continue their march. Washington wrote to Robert Morris saying he would need $20,000 to finance the campaign. Morris responded that there was simply no money or even credit left. Washington simply wrote, “Send for Haym Salomon.” Within days, Haym Salomon had raised the $20,000 needed for what proved to be the decisive victory of the Revolution.

Haym’s chessed continued after the war. Whenever he met someone who he felt had sacrificed during the war and needed financial assistance, he didn’t hesitate to do whatever he could to help.

He was also heavily involved in the Jewish community. He was a member of Congregation Mikveh Yisroel in Philadelphia, the fourth oldest synagogue in America, and he was responsible for the majority of the funds used to build the shul’s main building.

He also served as the treasurer to the Society for the Relief of Destitute Strangers, the first Jewish charitable organization in Philadelphia.

On January 8, 1785, Haym died suddenly at the age of 44. Due to the fact the government owed him hundreds of thousands of dollars, his family was left penniless.

His obituary in the Independent Gazetteer read:

Thursday, last, expired, after a lingering illness, Mr. Haym Salomon, an eminent broker of this city, was a native of Poland, and of the Hebrew nation. He was remarkable for his skill and integrity in his profession, and for his generous and humane deportment. His remains were yesterday deposited in the burial ground of the synagogue of this city.

Although there is little proof, many believe that when designing the American Great Seal, George Washington asked Salomon what he wanted as compensation for his generosity during the war. Salomon responded “I want nothing for myself, rather something for my people.” It is for this reason that the 13 stars are arranged in the shape of the Star of David.

[dontforgetukraine]

TIFF: And so it continues...

Update to Russians at War Screenings Effectively immediately, TIFF is forced to pause the upcoming screenings of Russians at War on Friday, Saturday, and Sunday as we have been made aware of significant threats to festival operations and public safety. While we stand firm on our statement shared yesterday, this decision has been made in order to ensure the safety of all festival guests, staff, and volunteers. This is an unprecedented move for TIFF. As a cultural institution, we support civil discourse about and through films, including differences of opinion, and we fully support peaceful assembly. However, we have received reports indicating potential activity in the coming days that pose significant risk; given the severity of these concerns, we cannot proceed as planned. This has been an incredibly difficult decision. When we select films, we’re guided by TIFF’s Mission, our Values, and our programming principles. We believe this film has earned a place in our Festival’s lineup, and we are committed to screening it when it is safe to do so. Effectively immediately, TIFF is forced to pause the upcoming screenings of Russians at War on Friday, Saturday, and Sunday as we have been made aware of significant threats to festival operations and public safety. While we stand firm on our statement shared yesterday, this decision has been made in order to ensure the safety of all festival guests, staff, and volunteers. This is an unprecedented move for TIFF. As a cultural institution, we support civil discourse about and through films, including differences of opinion, and we fully support peaceful assembly. However, we have received reports indicating potential activity in the coming days that pose significant risk; given the severity of these concerns, we cannot proceed as planned. This has been an incredibly difficult decision. When we select films, we’re guided by TIFF’s Mission, our Values, and our programming principles. We believe this film has earned a place in our Festival’s lineup, and we are committed to screening it when it is safe to do so.

While it's great this propaganda film was suspended (not cancelled), TIFF still double downed on their original stance.

What's not great is TIFF's insinuation that the supposed threats they received came from protesters and groups from the Ukrainian-Canadian community.

Meanwhile, a spokesperson for the Toronto police had this to say:

Toronto police said TIFF's decision to pause the screenings was "made independently by the event organizers and was not based on any recommendation" from police. "We were aware of the potential for protests and had planned to have officers present to ensure public safety," a police spokesperson wrote in an email. (Source)

So, it smells strongly like TIFF lied about the threats. If there were threats, they should have been reported, and when asked about it the police would hopefully be transparent enough to say they gave the recommendation.

Then there's this. My guess is they can't secure the theater from any sort of disruption, and they see protesting as a threat.

Protest outside media screening Large crowds gathered outside a Tuesday screening for media and industry members to take part in a protest organized by Ukrainian community groups and attended by officials, including Ukrainian Consul General Oleh Nikolenko. Demonstrators handed out pamphlets that criticized the film's attempts to "'humanize' the military of the aggressor country."  TIFF staff did not allow attendees to carry those pamphlets inside, though during the screening at least one woman handed them out to audience members in the theatre. Midway through the film, a man forced his way inside, shouting "You're watching a f--king propaganda film" before he was escorted out by security. (Source)

Meanwhile a statement from the producers of "Russian's at War" was released.

TIFF's decision to pause its screenings of "Russians at War" due to extreme security concerns is heartbreaking for us as filmmakers and Canadian Citizens. Our priority as producers, through this production, has been the safety and security of our courageous director, Anastasia Trofimova, despite her steadfast acceptance of these risks to make her documentary. We had assumed those risks would originate within Russia, not Canada. This is not a win for Canadians, including Ukrainian-Canadians. We condemn Deputy Prime Minister Chrystia Freeland, Ukraine Ambassador to Canada Yuliya Kovaliv, Consul General of Ukraine in Toronto Oleh Nikolenko, the Ukrainian Canadian Congress, Senators Donna Dasko and Stanley Kutcher, MP Yvan Baker (Etobicoke Centre) MPP Christine Hogarth (Etobicoke-Lakeshore) and other political and community "leaders." Their irresponsible, dishonest, and inflammatory public statements have incited the violent hate that has led to TIFF's painful decision to pause its presentation of "Russians at War". This temporary suppression is shockingly unCanadian. We call on Prime Minister Justin Trudeau to fully investigate this affront, from within a sovereign government, to our democratic values and a free media. We are firmly commited to giving Canada the opportunity to watch and reflect upon "Russians at War". We believe reason and truth will prevail. —The producers of "Russians at War" (Source)

Zero self-reflection, as expected.

I find it disgusting when they say "We had assumed those risks would originate within Russia, not Canada" as if what the FSB would do is equivalent to whatever could happen to them in Canada.... As if they'll be treated like how Russia treats Ukrainians, Crimean Tatars, POWs, journalists, political opponents, etc... :)

"Their irresponsible, dishonest, and inflammatory public statements have incited the violent hate..."

Outrage from a people that have currently and historically been victims of Russian propaganda, aggression, racism, and imperialism is not violent hate. People pointing out the propaganda is not hate. The protests at TIFF are not hate. I don't know where the other producers are from, but they sure do play the Russian victim frame of mind well.

Also, the Ukrainian community leaders are not being dishonest, irresponsible, hateful, or inflammatory.

THE PROPAGANDA IS IN YOUR TRAILER.

The people in the film have been MARINATING in it for their ENTIRE LIVES.

---

Even though the film has been suspended, the planned protest for the first public screening will still go on. Rightly so.

UCC Toronto: On Friday, Sept 13 we will meet in front of Scotiabank Theatre at 1:30pm for a peaceful protest against TIFF's decision to screen "Russians at War". This is the first public screening of the film and the director and some of the team will be present.

But some damage has already been done.

Headline of an article by Marsha Lederman reads: "Russians at War is an exceptional documentary and needs to be seen"

I will make a separate post about this article here. I started reading it and there is a line that made me gasp and almost fall over.

To be continued...

---

Please excuse the transcription of the images. I know they make the post longer, but I'm too aware of images on tumblr not loading. :/ Also, screen readers.

[metamorphesque]

ASALA: Armenian Secret Army for the Liberation of Armenia (part 1)

In 1915, ottoman turkey committed the Genocide of Armenians: more than 1.5 million Armenians were massacred.

Women were assaulted, raped, sexually mutilated and tortured. Many were killed by bayoneting or died from prolonged sexual abuse. The “lucky ones” managed to kill themselves, while others were sold as slaves, forced to work as prostitutes or into marriage by their perpetrators. An eyewitness testified, "It was a very common thing for them to rape our girls in our presence. Very often they violated eight or ten year old girls, and as a consequence many would be unable to walk, and were shot."

The men were usually separated from the rest of “the deportees” during the first few days and executed, but, of course, not before being tortured and mutilated. Some were crucified, beheaded, others were often drowned by being tied together back-to-back before being thrown in the water. So many bodies floated down the Tigris and Euphrates that they sometimes blocked the rivers and needed to be cleared with explosives. Other rotting corpses became stuck to the riverbanks, and still others traveled as far as the Persian Gulf.

In 1918, the young turk regime took the war into the Caucasus, where approximately 1,800,000 Armenians lived under Russian dominion. Ottoman forces advancing through East Armenia and Azerbaijan here too engaged in systematic massacres. The expulsions and massacres carried by the nationalist turks between 1920 and 1922 added tens of thousands of more victims. By 1923 the entire landmass of Asia Minor and historic West Armenia had been expunged of its Armenian population. The destruction of the Armenian communities in this part of the world was total.

And yet, despite all of this—the unimaginable horrors that plagued the Armenian nation in the early 20th century—what do you think the world did in response? After this descent into hell, after the suffering, the bloodshed, the total annihilation—what followed? Silence. Deafening, shameful silence, as always.

Silence—until it was shattered 58 years later, when, at the age of 78, having exhausted every peaceful avenue to draw the world’s attention to the Armenian Question and faced with nothing but ignorance, Gourgen Yanikyan fired 13 bullets at the Turkish consul and vice-consul. This singular act of defiance wiped 58 years of dust from the forgotten pages of Armenian history, forcing the world to confront the cause once again.By sacrificing his freedom, Yanikyan ignited a movement. His act became the catalyst for a wave of Armenian activism, inspiring the creation of ASALA, who would go on to fight for the recognition of the genocide.

In 1975, a group of Lebanese-Armenians led by Iraqi-Armenian Hakob Hakobyan, all of whose parents and/or grandparents were survivors of the genocide, inspired by Yanikyan’s self-sacrifice, decided to found an underground organization, which through armed actions will again bring the Armenian Question into the international political and legal dimension, present the recognition of the Armenian Genocide carried out by the turks in 1914-1923 by the international community, and create prerequisites for the liberation of Western Armenia. The organization was called ASALA - Armenian Secret Army for the Liberation of Armenia.

The military operations of the ASALA were mainly aimed at turkish embassies, consulates, diplomats, government officials, military and police institutions, the turkish business environment, especially the offices of "turkish airlines corporation", as well as the state and public structures of other countries, which showed financial or military support to the turkish state.

Now, why am I telling you about this today? Well, today - on September 24th marks the 43rd anniversary of the Van Operation (24/09/1981), carried out by 4 Armenian ASALA soldiers - Vazgen Sislyan, Hakob Julfayan, Gevorg Gyuzelyan and Aram Basmajyan. On this day in 1981, four Armenian youths, aged 20-24, armed with pistols, automatic rifles and explosives, seized the turkish consulate in Paris, holding it under their control for 15 hours.

4 Soldiers of The Van Operation taking off their masks

The trial of “VAN” turned into a trial of the turkish government. The “VAN” operation and the political trial that followed it played a major role in bringing the Armenian issue to the international political arena, globalizing the territorial claim and the violated rights of the Armenian people, creating a new wave of condemnation of the reality of the Armenian genocide, strengthening the pride and spirit of struggle among Armenians.

When all the hope has slipped away, It’s the mad who find a way.

Though violence is condemned, it is the cruel truth that it is the only language to which the world listens.

More about the Van Operation in the second part.

[hellshee]

ukrainian refugees protesting in front of the consulate of the russian federation in constanta, romania 24 february 2024

[andrevascreencaps]

Russian Consulate

[vickyvicarious]

As there is no motive for concealment, I am permitted to use them, and accordingly send you a rescript, simply omitting technical details of seamanship and supercargo. It almost seems as though the captain had been seized with some kind of mania before he had got well into blue water, and that this had developed persistently throughout the voyage. Of course my statement must be taken cum grano, since I am writing from the dictation of a clerk of the Russian consul, who kindly translated for me, time being short.

Interestingly, this is one of the few accounts (if not only) in the book that we know for a fact have been altered. Of course, we shouldn't totally discount the differences between shorthand vs. written English, but this is still another level. The captain's log as we know it has been translated from another language and had details removed. Those details were pretty much just technical jargon that wouldn't interest the average reader, but still.

Mr. Swales' talk of the (lack of) trustworthiness of the written accounts on the tombstones is a good prelude to this. And indeed we see the captain suspected of insanity, some even believing he was the killer, because ay least later parts of his account don't seem realistic. There are some really interesting discussions to be had about the trustworthiness of other people's stories, about the written word specifically, and how that relates to our experience as readers as well as the characters within the world.

[girlactionfigure]

Chiune Sugihara was a Japanese diplomat in Lithuania who put his family and career at risk by issuing thousands of hand-written transit visas to Jewish refugees fleeing Eastern Europe.

Chiune was born to a middle class family in Mino, Japan on the first day of the 20th century – 1/1/00. In elementary and high school he was a top student, and his father wanted him to become a doctor. Chiune’s own dream was to enter the foreign service, and he deliberately failed the medical school entrance exam by writing only his name on the test. Instead Chiune attended Waseda University and majored in English. He also joined a Christian fraternity to practice his English.

In 1919, Chiune passed the Foreign Ministry Scholarship exam, and served in the Japanese Imperial Army as a 2nd Lieutenant stationed in Korea. He resigned his commission in 1922 and trained for the Foreign Ministry, learning Russian and German in addition to English. He aced the qualifying exam and was sent to work in the foreign office in Harbin, China.

Chiune’s strong moral compass led him to resign his post as Deputy Foreign Minister in Manchuria because of rising Japanese violence against the Chinese (just two years later was the horrific Rape of Nanking by the Japanese Imperial Army.) Chiune returned to Japan, where he married Yukiko Kikuchi. They later had four sons.

Next Chiune went to Helsinki, Finland, where he worked as a translator for the Japanese delegation. In 1939, Chiune became vice-consul of the Japanese embassy in Kauna, Lithuania. Part of his job was to find out if Germany planned to attack the Soviet Union, and to relay any information about this to his bosses in Berlin and Tokyo.

In 1940, the Soviet Union occupied Lithuania. At that time, approximately 1/3 of Lithuanians were Jewish, many of them Torah scholars. The USSR viciously persecuted Jews, especially religious ones, and the Jews of Lithuania were desperate to escape the country – especially because Nazi Germany was occupying more and more of Eastern Europe and would soon be in Lithuania. Hundreds of them, mostly Orthodox, visited the Japanese consulate to beg for exit visas to Japan. The official Japanese policy was that candidates for visas must go through elaborate bureaucratic procedures and pay significant sums of money. Chiune contacted his superiors at the Japanese Foreign minister to ask if the rules could be relaxed to help Jewish refugees. His request was denied, as were his next two requests.

Chiune could have thrown up his hands and told the Jews there was nothing he could do for them, but instead, as he did in China, he was governed by his strong sense of right and wrong, rather than soulless bureaucrats. He ignored his orders and started issuing ten-day visas for Jews to travel through Japan on their way to safe havens like Shanghai, China, where 20,000 Jews rode out the war safely.

As word got out about the Japanese visas, Jews from all over Lithuania as well as Poland began to swarm Chiune’s office. He simply wouldn’t say no to anybody, and spent 18-20 hours a day (!) painstakingly writing visas by hand. He created a month’s supply of visas every single day from August to early September 1940, providing an escape route for thousands of Jews. On September 4, the Japanese consulate in Kauna was closed and Chiune had to leave the country. He was determined to create as many transit visas as possible, and continued doing so up until the last minute. At Kanuas Railway Station, a crowd of Jews gathered to say goodbye. Right before boarding the train, Chiune bowed deeply and cried out, “Please forgive me! I cannot write anymore. I wish you the best!” Someone in the crowd shouted, “Sugihara! We’ll never forget you! I’ll surely see you again!”

Chiune was reassigned to East Prussia, then Prague, and then Bucharest, Romania. When the Soviet Union occupied Lithuania in 1944, Chiune and his family were imprisoned in a POW camp for a year and a half. Finally they were released in 1946 and returned to Japan, but the foreign office had heard about his unauthorized visas, and he was forced to resign. At about this time, the Sugihara’s youngest son died of leukemia at age seven.

Unemployable in Japan, Chiune made use of his excellent Russian language skills and spent the next 16 years working in the Soviet Union while his wife and sons stayed in Japan. Chiune’s exceptional heroism was unknown for many years, until 1968, when he was contacted by Yehoshua Nishri, an attache working at the Israeli consulate in Tokyo. Nishri spent his youth in Poland, and heard stories of the legendary Japanese hero. Nishri made it his mission to publicize Chiune’s heroic acts, and the next year, 1969, Chiune traveled to Israel as an honored guest of the Israeli government. Jews he’d saved lobbied for him to be recognized as Righteous Among the Nations by Israeli Holocaust Memorial Yad Vashem, and in 1984 he received the honor. At that time he was too sick to travel, so his wife and son Nobuki accepted the award on his behalf.

Chiune was asked why he risked everything to help thousands of strangers. He answered, “You want to know about my motivation, don’t you? Well. It is the kind of sentiments anyone would have when he actually sees refugees face to face, begging with tears in their eyes. He just cannot help but sympathize with them. Among the refugees were the elderly and women. They were so desperate that they went so far as to kiss my shoes. Yes, I actually witnessed such scenes with my own eyes. Also, I felt at that time, that the Japanese government did not have any uniform opinion in Tokyo. Some Japanese military leaders were just scared because of the pressure from the Nazis; while other officials in the Home Ministry were simply ambivalent. People in Tokyo were not united. I felt it silly to deal with them. So, I made up my mind not to wait for their reply. I knew that somebody would surely complain about me in the future. But, I myself thought this would be the right thing to do. There is nothing wrong in saving many people’s lives… The spirit of humanity, philanthropy… neighborly friendship… with this spirit, I ventured to do what I did, confronting this most difficult situation – and because of this reason, I went ahead with redoubled courage.”

Chiune Sugihara died in Japan on July 31, 1986. Despite being a hero in Israel, and among Jews worldwide, he was completely unknown in his own country. Even his own children didn’t know what he had done. A huge delegation from around the world attended Chiune’s funeral, and only then did he become known in Japan.

Chiune received many awards and accolades, most of them posthumous. Among them are Sugihara Streets in Vilna, Lithuania, and Jaffa and Netanya in Israel. There is a Sugihara House Museum in Kaunas, and a park in Vilna where 200 trees were planted on his 100th birthday. There is a life-sized statue of him in Little Tokyo in Los Angeles, featuring a plaque with a quotation from the Talmud, “He who saves one life, saves an entire world.” In 1998, Chiune’s widow Yukiko traveled to Israel and was warmly received by survivors who’d been saved by her husband. There is a Sugihara park in Jerusalem, and he was featured on an Israeli postage stamp in 1998. The Lithuanian government declared 2020 “The Year of Chiune Sugihara.” He has been the subject of multiple works of art, including books, films and a play.

It’s estimated that over 100,000 people are alive today because of the brave actions of Chiune Sugihara.

[molfarua]

❗🗺 Should there be such a car in front of every russian consulate/embassy?🤣

➡️ IF YES - 👍 ➡️ Completely agree - subscribe 💛💙 https://bit.ly/molfarua

❗🗺 Чи має бути такий автомобіль перед кожним російським консульством/посольством?🤣

➡️ ЯКЩО ТАК — 👍 ➡️ Повністю зго��ні — підписка 💛💙 https://bit.ly/molfarua

[lookingforhappy]

the commission had Leon Trotsky - who was a important figure in the Russian revolutions, was second in command to Valdimir Lenin, and who opposed Stalin's politics - assassinated.

the file this is found in is addressed as one of Five's cases ↑

transcript:

MEMORANDUM ON INTENDED EVENTS RE: THE DEATH OF LEON TROTSKY August 21, 1940 Background: On 24 May 1940, Trotsky survived a raid on his villa by armed assassins led by the NKVD agent Iosif Grigulevich and Mexican painter David Alfaro Siqueiros. Trotsky's 14-year-old grandson, Vsevolod Platonovich "Esteban" Volkov (born 7 March 1926), was shot in the foot, and a young assistant and bodyguard of Trotsky, Robert Sheldon Harte, was abducted and later murdered. Trotsky's other guards fended off the attackers. Event to Occur: With the previous attack thwarted, the following is to take place, ensuring continuity. Trotsky has already created cover by claiming that Josef Stalin would seek additional assassination attempts. On 20 August 1940, Trotsky will be attacked in his study with an ice axe by one Mr. Mercader, whom he has not previously met. Our agent will assume the guise of Mr. Mercader. The blow to his head is to be bungled and fail to kill Trotsky instantly, but nonetheless prove fatal. A struggle will ensue and though the agent is to be captured, his extraction will occur at a future moment of Commission discretion, at which time a bosy double will be placed as perpetrator and will stand trial for the assault. His sacrifice for the Commission will be noted in the logs. Witnesses are to see the following and make their claims to the new media and local law enforcement: that Trotsky spat on Mercader and began struggling fiercelt with the assasilant, which results in Mercader's hand being broken. Hearing the commotion, Trotsky's bodyguards burst into the room and nearly killed you, but Trotsky will stop them, stating that the assassin should be made to answer questions. Trotsky will then be taken to a hospital, operated on, and survive for more than a day, dying at the age of 60 on 21 August 1940 from exsanguination and shocck. The agent will testify at trial and remain imprisoned until the moment of extraction and replacement by the secrificial unit. A history of Trotsky's exile: In February 1929, Trotsky was deported from the Soviet Union to his new exile in Turkey. During his first teo months in Turkey, Trotsky lived with his wife and eldest son at the Soviet Union Consulate in Constantinople and then at a nearby hotel in the city. In April 1929, Trotsky, his wife and son were moved to the island of Buyukada (aka Prinkipo) by the Turkish authorities. On Prinkipo, they were moved into a house called the Yanaros mansion, where Trotsky and his wife lived until July 1933. During his exile in Turkey, Trotsky was under the surveillance of the Turkish police forces of Mustafa Kemal Pasha. Trotsky was also at risk from the many former White Army officers who lived on Prinkipo, officers who had opposed the October Revolution and who had been defeated by Trotsky and the Red Army in the Russian Civil War. However, Totsky's European supporters volunteered to serve as bodyguards and assured his safety. Trotsky's house, the Yanaros mansion on the island of Buyukada in Turkey, as it

TROTSKY ASSASSINATION ATTEMPT INTELLIGENCE SUMMARY Place | Date | Hour | Summary of Events and Information | Remarks MOSCOW, April | 2. | A deviation occured in the first agent's plot assassinate Leon Trotsky in May of 1940. | EF 5. | Progress in planning of the second plot, for August 20, 194, has progressed unhindered. | SB MEXICO CITY May | 7. | Leon Trotsky will be in his study on August 20, 1940, as expected, and will be welcoming his guest, one Mr. Mercader, whom he has never met previously. | - 9. | The tool to be used for this attack, an ice axe, will be placed in discrete location No. 224-MC-B12, Annex 16, per Commission protocol. | EF 20. | The Mission objective will be carried out, after which time the parameters of expected history will be reset to their correct trajectories. | TD Instructions regarding Intelligence Summaries are contained in Regula II and the Management Manual. Title pages will be prepared in manuscript.

To CASE MANAGER 0038 From FIELD AGENT 00293 Subject Trotsky assassination attempt Pneumatic Transit Code [multiple strongs of number as seen in the image above] My recommendation is to reconsider our current outlook concerning the viability of the subject's tool of action, the ice axe, in light of recent events. The project has stalled at numerous points over the past months and contines to progress at a menial pace. Should the current iteration of the device be completed as is it will fail to provide enough force to puncture the fuel tank given the density of the aluminum alloy used in the manufacturing of the encasement. I expect that the subject will proceed as required.

[mariacallous]

Eric Adams wanted to see the world, to see it in style. But he wasn’t a rich man, just a former cop and rising politician in a largely ceremonial job, Brooklyn Borough President. Luckily for him, there were a number of benefactors who federal prosecutors say were ready to help him travel in a manner benefitting the position he was angling for: mayor of New York City.

According to a sprawling, 57-page indictment unsealed on Thursday, there was the chairman of a Turkish university; a promoter “whose business includes organizing events to introduce Turkish corporations and businesspeople to politicians, celebrities, and others whose influence may benefit the corporations”; and a senior official in the Turkish government, who, prosecutors say, “later steered illegal contributions and improper gifts to Adams to gain influence with and, eventually, to obtain corrupt official action from Adams.” 

Adams in the summer of 2017 went with his son and a staffer to Nice, Istanbul, Sri Lanka, and Beijing, flying business class the whole way. In October, he went again to Istanbul and Beijing, and then on to Nepal. Those tickets were, all told, worth $51,000. But he got it all for free. 

The relationship deepened from there, as Adams began to run for mayor in earnest. The Turks allegedly funneled money to his campaign through false entities, or “straw donors.” Accepting such donations is against the law — and Adams allegedly received public matching funds based on these contributions. Adams allegedly returned the favor, in part by pressuring the fire department to allow the opening of a $300 million, 36-story glass tower to house the Turkish consulate, just off of First Avenue and 45th Street, without an inspection and “in time for a high-profile visit by Turkey‘s president” — a diplomatic coup for a man who’s functionally a dictator.

Adams has vigorously denied all of the charges. And at least one Adams ally I spoke with in the immediate aftermath breathed a quarter-sigh of relief — this person was expecting even more, and more serious, charges. “It’s obviously not great but this is weaker than I thought it would be,” the source tells me.

But that exhale assumes that the federal charges against Adams begin and end in this document. They almost certainly do not, with at least four more federal probes reportedly targeting his inner circle and FBI agents searching the mayor’s residence shortly before the indictment was announced. It also assumes that the Turks were the only government to allegedly turn Adams into an unregistered foreign agent. That, too, could prove to be a dangerous supposition — especially given the U.S. Attorney in Brooklyn’s pursuit of Chinese influence in New York. 

In the last four years, that federal prosecutor’s office alone has charged a dozen separate criminal cases of covert Chinese government interference in U.S. politics, business, and civil society. An aide to New York’s governor was indicted as a foreign agent on Sept. 3. An ex-corrections officer got 20 months for harassing an artist who lampooned Chinese leader Xi Jinping. Two more men were arrested for operating a secret Chinese police station out of the Manhattan headquarters of a group for expats from Fujian province. 

The examples spiral out from there.In July, a federal jury in Manhattan convicted Robert Menendez, a Democratic U.S. senator from New Jersey, of taking bribes and acting as Egypt’s agent. In August, federal prosecutors in Brooklyn charged a hitman with trying to assassinate Donald Trump, allegedly on Iran’s orders. In September, prosecutors in Manhattan revealed an alleged Russian plot to funnel $10 million to MAGA influencers. This is a partial list. A snippet of a list, really. And all of these developments happened in just the last few months, just in and around this one metro area, where a wide array of foreign actors are looking to turn New York into something like Spy City.  

The 20 experts, officials, and activists I spoke to couldn’t agree on whether these cases represent a major escalation in this covert activity, an increase in Washington’s willingness to combat it, or both. But they all agreed that such efforts are widespread and being directed by countries across the globe. And while it might be tempting to speculate about what this says about the various foreign policy strategies in foreign capitals, the clear takeaway is that malicious actors around the world see America as pliable, and influence as something that can be bought on the cheap. In other words, the most disturbing part about these covert foreign pressure campaigns is what it says about our politics, our society. About us.

ONE OF THE MORE disturbing foreign influence cases to recently come to light begins 35 years ago, in Beijing. Yan Xiong was a student activist there, jailed for being part of the big Tiananmen Square protests. When he got out, he made his way to America, enlisted in the U.S. Army, and eventually served two tours as a chaplain in Iraq. By 2021, Yan was running for Congress in lower Manhattan. He could tell that something was off. He’d show up to candidate forums, and then wouldn’t be allowed to speak. He’d try to raise money, no dice. There was an old man who wouldn’t stop taking pictures of Yan’s campaign. Yan would go out to his driveway late at night and find a car there, headlights blazing. It was unnerving, but Yan was used to looking over his shoulder.

Nevertheless, Yan was shocked when, in March of 2022, federal prosecutors revealed that he was being targeted by the Chinese government. The goal: to surveil and sabotage the chaplain’s long-shot campaign. “Go deep and dig up something. Right? For example, past incidents of tax evasion… if he used prostitutes in the past… if he had a mistress,” a member of China’s Ministry of State Security allegedly told a private investigator here in the U.S. If the private investigator couldn’t come up with — or make up — any dirt, the P.I. was encouraged to use other means to take Yan out of the race: “In the end, violence would be fine too.” 

In the end, Yan’s campaign netted him only 750 votes — not great, but 50 percent more than former Mayor Bill De Blasio received. The P.I. hired by the Chinese government never found any dirt on Yan, or physically attacked him. But the attempt to ratfuck Yan’s campaign continues to leave a wound. Yan’s getting ready to move for the fifth time in two years — in part “for safety, for psychology.” In August, prosecutors unveiled another layer to the alleged plot against him. The old man who’d been taking all those pictures? He was a former Tiananmen Square veteran, too — one who was now accused of working as an unregistered agent for Beijing. To Yan, he’s another “victim” of a regime that’s all-too-willing to extend its reach here. “It’s a tragedy, that’s my opinion,” Yan tells me.

And Yan’s case isn’t the only one in which there seem to be shadowy figures just out of frame. Shujun Wang, another longtime Chinese dissident, was convicted in late August of working as Beijing’s spy. The other day, I called his lawyer to ask about a member of the defense team, a man listed in court documents as a paralegal, who was, in fact, a Florida realtor, recently acquitted of rape. What was he doing there? Who was he? “He is nobody,” the lawyer answered.  

These influence campaigns by foreign governments, prosecutors allege, reach all the way down to the lowest levels of state and local government. Take Linda Sun, who started in 2012 as one of the more junior aides out of 200 or so in Governor Andrew Cuomo’s office. The former beauty pageant contestant and Barnard grad, who had come to New York from Nanjing when she was a kid, put in the work as a liaison to the borough of Queens and the state’s Asian American community. She’d help connect constituents to government services, make appearances at Lunar New Year events, write up proclamations, and liaise with foreign consulates. Over the years, she gained leverage. Cuomo’s communications shop — described by one former colleague as “95 percent Caucasian” — relied on Sun to tell them how a state proclamation or press release might resonate in Asian communities.

“She did her job. She went home. Didn’t cause any trouble, never caused any drama. But in hindsight, [there was] a lot of trust in that particular position. Because when you ask her opinion about how something plays, we were asking how it plays in, you know, [the Chinese American neighborhoods of] Sunset Park and Flushing. Not how it played in Beijing,” that source tells me.

By 2015, Sun had a willing ear in Kathy Hochul, the new Lieutenant Governor, who was iced out of Cuomo’s inner circle — and eager to build up her own political constituency. Hochul made sure to attend Chinese American community celebrations and events to promote trade with Beijing. (A Hochul aide notes that she interfaced with all kinds of foreign officials, including a half-dozen such meetings just with the Canadians in 2016.) Sun made sure there were all sorts of meetings Hochul wouldn’t take, wouldn’t even know were offered. For example, prosecutors allege, when officials from the rival government of Taiwan tried to get together with Hochul in D.C. in mid-2016, Sun scheduled talks with Beijing’s representatives instead — and then bragged to the Chinese consulate about what she had done. Hochul began to be quoted favorably and often by Beijing’s official state news agency. Sun started to receive gifts from Chinese officials, prosecutors say: tickets to Carnegie Hall, then a wire transfer for $47,895 for travel expenses. 

As Sun’s responsibilities increased, her profile grew. She worked with legislators when Korean American nail salons were revealed to be serially underpaying their workers. She helped steer money to Asian American groups as threats to them rose during the pandemic.

By 2021, Hochul was governor. Sun had a bigger title, deputy chief of staff, and was displaying sharper elbows. “She felt very emboldened with making sure that there was a focus [on] protecting mainland China’s agendas,” State Assemblyman Ron Kim, who previously held Sun’s community liaison job, recalls. “That was universally understood, because when myself and other[s] carried certain resolutions to celebrate U.S.-Taiwan relations, I got calls from the governor’s office letting me know that the Chinese consulate is very upset with you, and they would prefer if I don’t do such resolutions again.” (Sun has pleaded not guilty to charges she acted as an agent of the Chinese government, and her attorneys declined to comment for this story.) 

This might seem arcane and sort of small-ball. Who cares if some local pol doesn’t issue a Taiwan proclamation? But it’s part of a strategy, says Bethany Allen, author of Beijing Rules, echoing the sentiments of several U.S. officials. “If this is done extensively, consistently, quietly across many states, many state capitals, many state governments, local governments,” Allen tells me, “it can shape the debate. Have a strong downward pressure on the things that China wants to quiet.” 

And it’s a strategy that Beijing is willing to pursue over the long haul — to influence people at the lowest levels of local government, and let those folks rise over time. Back when she was a reporter, Allen broke the news of a suspected Chinese spy in California who cultivated relationships from the political to the romantic with city councilmen, small-town mayors, and at least one Congressman. The spy’s true motivations weren’t uncovered until that Congressman, Rep. Eric Swalwell, was on the verge of joining the House Intelligence Committee and gaining access to some of the nation’s better-protected national secrets. (Swalwell denied any romantic relationship, and a House ethics panel decided to take no action against him after a two-year investigation.)  

Linda Sun’s case never reached that kind of crisis point. But her value to Chinese officials was clear. The wire transfers were in the millions by 2021. The Chinese Consul General in New York — a sharp, genial diplomat named Huang Ping — sent Nanjing-style salted ducks to Sun’s parents, a half-dozen at a time. According to one source, she started showing up with a fresh tan and a new, high-end handbag to every community event. “People were definitely talking about how she went from rags to riches overnight,” Kim tells me. “Her parents lived in a one-bedroom apartment… She was trying to get a mortgage to buy a condo in Flushing, and she could barely get that. But all of a sudden, now she’s living in a mansion.” And in a sweet vacation home, too. Around the same time Sun and her husband bought a $3.6 million home in Manhasset, New York, they also, according to prosecutors, purchased “an ocean-view condominium on the 47th floor of a high rise building in Honolulu, Hawaii, currently valued at approximately $2.1 million.”

SUN AND ADAMS ARE the first local officials to be charged with acting as agents of a foreign power. They probably won’t be the last, or even the last in New York. (“What you saw with the governor in New York, that’s going to be scratching an itch that tickles in a lot of different places,” Bill Evanina, who spent seven years as the federal government’s top counterintelligence official, tells me.) The place has long attracted spies and clandestine power brokers, and not just because of the UN, or Wall Street, or all the corporate headquarters. America’s best city is, not coincidentally, also its most diverse; more than three million of the eight million-plus people living here are foreign-born. Those diasporas are often of intense interest to the countries from which they spring, especially if the countries in question are ruled by authoritarians. The revolutionary movements that took down the Czar, the Chinese Emperor, and the Shah were all incubated overseas. 

These diasporas also can wield outsized power in local politics, too. New York’s election laws are so labyrinthine and complex, with elections held on off-years and on strange dates, that they’re practically designed to keep people from voting. (Ron Kim has 115,000 people living in his district in Queens, for example; fewer than 3,200 of them voted in his contested primary race, which is the only race that matters in a one-party town.) So if any one group gets behind a single candidate, or gins up turnout, or dumps in a lot of money, it can swing an election. Kim faced off against a primary opponent backed by a well-known local community leader who is openly supportive of the Chinese Communist Party. They each poured more than $600,000 into that tiny-turnout primary race. “I felt this was a clear effort to get a political seat for a person who is loyal to their agenda,” Kim says. “This isn’t about lawmaking in [the state capital of] Albany, but it’s about being the power broker of Flushing that will give them credibility and access.”

This is all happening in a place where the politics are — there’s no other way to put this — corrupt as fuck. The five federal investigations reportedly swirling around Adams and his closest associates involve everyone from the police commissioner to the schools chancellor to his top fundraisers to a pair of deputy mayors. Adams’ immediate predecessor, de Blasio, dodged indictment for violating campaign finance laws, but not by much. After leaving office, former mayor Rudy Giuliani took money from a North Korean gangster and then worked with a man he admitted was likely a Russian spy. Long Island’s George Santos was expelled from Congress after less than a year; he recently pleaded guilty to identity theft and wire fraud. One of Santos’ bigger Republican critics on the Island, Rep. Anthony D’Esposito, was just exposed for giving Congressional jobs to his lover and his fiancée’s daughter. 

You get the idea: plenty of politicians with their hands out; elections practically designed to be swayed by small groups; those small groups susceptible to foreign infiltration and pressure, because they’ve all got family back home. “New York would be at the top of the list in terms of foreign governments, foreign regimes wanting to target,” says Casey Michel, author of the newly published Foreign Agents. “Especially New York City. I don’t think it’s any surprise that the major investigation into a municipal authority as a target of potential foreign influence is Adams.”

So let’s talk about the mayor. Adams has been ducking corruption allegations — and playing diaspora politics — for more than 15 years. According to the New York Times, a grand jury in July issued subpoenas related to Adams’ ties to six different countries: China, Qatar, South Korea, Israel, Uzbekistan, and, of course, Turkey. In his role as Brooklyn Borough President, Adams attended almost 80 events connected with Turkey, and at least 50 more celebrating China. Some of those events actually upset his Turkish government contacts, according to the indictment. In 2016, a Turkish official told Adams that a community center he used to visit “was affiliated with a Turkish political movement that was hostile to Turkey’s government… If Adams wished to continue receiving support from the Turkish government, Adams could no longer associate with the community center. Adams acquiesced.”

Adams also met multiple times with Huang Ping, the Chinese Consul General who prosecutors later identified as Linda Sun’s handler. And the politicking seemingly continued overseas. Adams took 13 separate trips to Turkey and China, which is a lot of travel to those two specific nations, considering borough presidents don’t really have foreign policy roles. “It’s totally appropriate,” he said after the first of the trips to China, in 2014. “I’m not going to be a MetroCard borough president — I’m going to be a passport borough president.”

City Hall won’t say what all of the trips were for. (They didn’t respond to requests to comment for this story.) The alleged purpose of the Turkey trips, at least, is now less murky after the indictment’s release.When it comes to the others, here’s what we can say for sure: We know that one of Adams’ China travel partners, his longtime Asian community liaison Winnie Greco, had her former campaign office and several of her homes raided by the FBI. We know that Greco and another Adams crony met separately in Fuzhou, the capital of Fujian province, with the man later indicted for operating that secret Chinese police station out of a Fujianese expat society in Manhattan. We know that Adams and Greco appeared onstage at a gala for that charity — the American Changle Association, named for a famed neighborhood in Fuzhou — shortly before it was exposed as a secret police front bythe New York Post. We know Adams was with Association bigwig Lu Jianwang days before Lu was arrested in the secret police affair. We know, thanks to local news outlet The City, that 121 workers at the New World Mall in Queens, the site of Greco’s 2021 campaign office, made donations to Adams of precisely $249 each, one buck below the limit for eight-times public matching funds. Several donors said they were reimbursed in cash, or had no idea they had been listed as contributors at all. This has all the hallmarks of illegal straw donations, as Adams’ team surely knows.One Chinese billionaire who gave money to Adams (and hosted his 60th birthday party) recently pleaded guilty to such charges. 

MAYBE ALL OF THESE connections were on the up-and-up. Maybe Adams’ trips to China and extremely odd donations from his campaign office in Flushing were no more nefarious than the 70-plus flag-raising ceremonies for various countries he’s attended in his two-and-a-half years as mayor. Maybe it’s an accident of scheduling that Huang Ping, the Chinese Consul General, asked him to blow off a banquet with the Taiwanese president and Adams wound up doing just that. Adams may have rubbed elbows with people who were later indicted as foreign agents in groups like the American Changle Association, where voters gather for an old-country meal or speak in their parents’ dialect. There’s hardly an elected official in New York who didn’t make such a visit, or get his picture taken at some point with Huang. Of course they did. Huang was a gregarious, effective, charming diplomat. He may be accused of secretly handling alleged agents like Linda Sun, but chatting up local politicians was most definitely Huang’s job.  

You don’t have to be some kind of simp for Beijing to find this kind of criminalization of foreign influence a little hypocritical, given all the governments the U.S. helped overthrow in the past century. You’re not necessarily an abolish-the-police type if you think the feds have gone overboard in their hunt for Chinese agents. “We’re not China. We’re supposedly a free country, and the government should take more care in prosecuting and, in turn, persecuting people,” John Liu, a state senator from Queens, tells me. This is personal for him. While he was gearing up to run for mayor more than a decade ago, the FBI ran a sting on him and his donors, part of a straw-donor probe he says was oh-so-subtly named “Operation Red Money.” They did find some straw donors, and a top aide did go to jail. But Liu himself was only fined $26,000 — proof, he says, that the whole investigation was overheated. Nor is it a one-off. Liu points to cases like Baimadajie Angwang, the cop accused of spying for China, only to have the charges dropped without explanation. By that time, the NYPD had fired him. “You know what? It wouldn’t be so bad if the government pursued these cases, made them as visible as they intentionally make them, and actually had a pretty good record of success,” Liu says. “It bothers me that there’s no accountability of any kind. You know, the government does this, and it doesn’t matter how many lives are ruined [or] the impact on the wider community.” 

There’s no question there’s been overreach, including horror stories of Chinese Americans interrogated by the FBI, seemingly for no reason at all. “We should absolutely oppose any effort by any foreign government to undermine our American society, our way of life, our democracy,” says Rep. Grace Meng, who hired Linda Sun when she was in the State Assembly and now represents a large part of Queens in the U.S. Congress. But “there’s a lot of fear right now in the Asian American community,” she adds. “Every day, young, professional Asian Americans are really scared that these harmful stereotypes are being fueled… [by] questions that are asked only of us.”

As overzealous as some prosecutors may have been, though, and as ugly our recent turn toward anti-China and anti-immigrant politics, there are too many of these foreign influence cases, tied to so many different outside actors, to brush off. A former Republican Congressman is under indictment for covertly working for Venezuela’s dictator. A major Trump fundraiser pleaded guilty to doing the same on behalf of the Chinese and Malaysian government officials, in a case so weird and sprawling, a member of the Fugees wound up with a foreign agent conviction as part of it. Things are so bad, the guy that’s supposed to be leading the investigations into these cases in New York — the head of the state’s FBI counterintelligence division — was himself sentenced earlier this year to federal prison for doing the bidding of a sanctioned Russian oligarch. The MAGA crowd can whine all they want about the #resistance obsession with “Russia, Russia, Russia.” Folks on the political left can roll their eyes at what feels like a Trumpy obsession with Chinese influence, or another red scare. It takes a kind of willful blindness not to see a pattern here. Liu, for one, called on Adams to resign after prosecutors unveiled their indictment which showed just how deep the mayor’s ties to Turkey went.

“This isn’t a Republican problem or a Democratic problem — it’s completely bipartisan,“ Michel tells me. “And as we’re now seeing, it’s not just one level of government these regimes are targeting. It’s everyone.”

For half a century, the American government hardly bothered to enforce the Foreign Agents Registration Act, which requires influence-peddlers to disclose their overseas clients, at least. That changed after the 2016 election, when Trump recruited the O.G. of scummy foreign lobbying, Paul Manafort, to run his campaign and publicly begged for a dictator’s help to win. The Department of Justice went on to prosecute Manafort and so many others — from the Russian troll farm to the white-shoe law firm Skadden, Arps — for breaking that law. Brandon van Grack, who oversaw many of those prosecutions as head of the Justice Department’s Foreign Agents Registration Act unit, says the apparent surge in cases we’re seeing, eight years later, is a result of that 2016 wake-up call. He credits “greater resources and tools to identify and disrupt those influence operations than an increase in the operations themselves,” adding, “Foreign influence is not novel.”

It’s not exactly dying down, either. A few years ago, you might have thought that prosecuting folks like Manafort would at least serve as a warning shot. The sheer range of regimes trying to influence the 2024 election paints a different picture, and I don’t just mean the fact that Manafort is a free man and doing Fox News hits from the Republican convention. “I would say that a couple things are true in this specific situation. Yes, there are more investigations, because there are allowed to be. And I think our adversaries are more brazen than they have ever been,” Evanina, the former counterintelligence chief, tells me. 

There’s a good argument that the number of prosecutions isn’t even the right metric to gauge foreign influence. Registering as an overseas lobbyist — dodging a FARA charge — that’s the easy part. More than 1,000 foreign principals have done so since 2016, spending more than $5.5 billion to whisper in lawmakers’ ears. At least 90 former members of Congress have registered since 2000 to push another government’s agenda. Scores of U.S. generals and admirals have taken jobs with foreign governments in the last decade, with Saudi Arabia alone hiring 15 retired flag officers. Biden talked in 2020 about banning former officials from lobbying for foreign powers. It was just talk.  

The Supreme Court in recent years has radically raised the bar on bribery cases, and functionally removed any restrictions on campaign spending. That’s allowed Americans closely aligned with foreign governments to make enormous investments in shaping U.S. policy. The best known of these are the lobbyists pushing the agenda of Israeli leader Benjamin Netanyahu, who gave over a million dollars to the now-convicted Sen. Menendez, even after he was indicted, and spent millions more on successful primary campaigns to knock out two of Israel’s few critics in Congress. None of this violates any laws. But maybe that’s beside the point. The real foreign influence scandal, Michel tells me, is how much of it is “perfectly legal.” 

If you’re mad at outside actors for exploiting America’s system, don’t be. The United States is still the world’s biggest power; of course every other nation is going to try to pull us in their direction. Try directing your anger a little closer to home. All of these politicians on the take, we voted for them. The bullshit China or Iran pumps out on TikTok? It’s downright factual compared to the nonsense we Americans push one another. And if you think a guy like Eric Adams is an outlier with his, shall we say, open-minded approach to campaign finance and outside influences, allow me to introduce you to the Republican nominee for president and his inner circle. The Congress we elected has bottled up nearly every attempt to close these foreign-funding loopholes. The campaigns we supported went along with the Supreme Court’s decision to make elections a feeding frenzy. This is a choice. Collectively, we made it.

IN THE HOURS AFTER Linda Sun and her husband were charged as Chinese agents on Sept. 3, Gov. Hochul urged the U.S. government to expel Sun’s alleged handler, Consul General Huang Ping, and a State Department spokesperson claimed that Huang had “rotated out of the position.” Yet on the night of Sept. 5, at Manhattan’s storied Plaza Hotel, Huang Ping appeared onstage at the China Institute’s $2,500-per-ticket Blue Cloud gala, looking rather dapper in a well-tailored tuxedo. Pictures were posted to the consulate’s website two days later. “Consul General Huang Ping is performing his duties as normal,” read a statement sent out to reporters.

A few hours after he was indicted, Huang’s longtime interlocutor Eric Adams promised to do much the same. “My attorneys will take care of the case, so I can take care of this city,” he said. “My day to day will not change.” 

[winxwiki]

On the W.i.t.c.h. vs Winx Club plagiarism case

According to this forum user that has spoken to active Disney Italy artists, Francesco Artibani took the character designs sheets and proposed them to Rainbow before the official W.i.t.c.h. comic came out.

Officially, Artibani has said that he was called by Rai "to make sure Winx was not too similar to W.i.t.c.h.; Disney was fine with me working on it". That's odd, since he's credited as a writer on Winx, not as a consulent or anything like that (there is a fashion consulent on the team, for example).

The W.i.t.c.h. project started in '97, while Winx started in '99, both while Sailor Moon Sailor Stars was done airing in Italy. The Magica Bloom Pilot was approved in 2001 by RAI but Iginio Straffi decided to scrap it in 2002, albeit parts of it were salvaged (according to his Rimini Comix interview, likely for episode 1). If W.i.t.c.h.'s italian 2001 release influenced the pilot's retooling is unknown, though storywise Winx was already set in stone according to Iginio. It was only the artstyle that needed retooling.

Timeline by user Iku

It's curious though that Magica Bloom did not have a diverse cast, as Flora and Musa were white. Musa was also redesigned the most.

To make the spy rumours worse, official Winx art taking poses from W.i.t.c.h. does exist:

this concept art of Flora which has never been inked and colored

Various comparisons from a russian website

It's also well known by credits that Disney and Rainbow had freelance artists working left and right. The italian comic and animation industry at the time was just very small.

The lawsuit Disney made focused on the brand, genre and name instead of investigating further on character designs and ideas being tossed around despite NDAs. Could it be that Disney didn't want to make enemies of their best writers and artists?

Afterall, Artibani still works for both Rainbow and Disney to this day and so do many others... despite claiming of having left for 6 years in 2004. While working on the W.i.t.c.h. cartoon and Monster Allergy (while it was under Disney).

Either way, don't be shocked, as this is common in magical girls. Wedding Peach was one of the earliest Sailor Moon "clones" made by ex staff of the series and Izumi Todo's team at Toei constantly references itself and other properties with Precure and each new series even in official art (Tokyo Mew Mew? Doremi? Sailor Moon? Precure A La Mode has it all!).