Escort says she has proof of Russian meddling
Claims to have 16 hours of audio recordings that relate to U.S. election Anastasia Vashukevich, at an immigration detention centre in Bangkok, says she fears for her life.
BANGKOK— A Belarusian escort with close ties to a powerful Russian oligarch said from behind bars in Bangkok Monday that she had more than16 hours of audio recordings that could shed light on Russian meddling in U.S. elections.
The escort, Anastasia Vashukevich, said she would hand over the recordings if the United States granted her asylum. She faces criminal charges and deportation to Belarus after coming under suspicion of working in Thailand without a visa at a sex-training seminar in the city of Pattaya.
Vashukevich, who described herself as close to Russian aluminum tycoon Oleg Deripaska, said audio recordings she made in August 2016 included discussions he had about the United States presidential election with people she declined to identify.
Deripaska, a billionaire with close ties to Russia’s president, Vladimir Putin, also has business ties to Paul Manafort, U.S. President Donald Trump’s former campaign chair. Manafort is under investigation by Robert Mueller, the special counsel looking into the campaign’s connections to Russia.
“If America gives me protection, I will tell everything I know,” Vashukevich said Monday. “I am afraid to go back to Russia. Some strange things can happen.” Her assertion could be easy to disregard were it not for a 25-minute video investigation posted last month on YouTubeby Russian opposition figure Alexei Navalny, which relies heavily on videos and photographs from Vashukevich.
She and nine people from Russia, Ukraine and Belarus were arrested late last month in Pattaya, a city 110 kilometres south of Bangkok known for its adult entertainment scene. Most of those arrested, including Vashukevich, 21, who also goes by the name Nastya Rybka, are accused of working without a permit. Some are also accused of not having a valid Thai visa.
Vashukevich and Alexander Kirillov, the organizer of the sex seminar, spoke to three reporters while standing behind bars and a mesh screen during visiting hours at the Immigration Detention Center in Bangkok. Immigration officials stopped the interviews midway and told the reporters to leave the facility.
Vashukevich, wearing a bright green T-shirt with the word “detainee” in Thai, is a long way from the days she spent sailing on a yacht with Deripaska and his friends, including Sergei Prikhodko, a deputy prime minister.
According to her version of events, she was with a modelling agency when she and other models were sent to spend time on Deripaska’s yacht. She later posted photographs and videos on social media showing Deripaska and Prikhodko together on the yacht.
Financial records show that companies controlled by Manafort owed millions of dollars to Deripaska. During the 2016 presidential campaign, Manafort offered to give Deripaska private briefings on the campaign.
Navalny charged in his video that Deripaska’s yacht trip was an attempt to bribe Prikhodko, and that Vashukevich was one of “several” prostitutes aboard the vessel. In the video, the tycoon and Prikhodko can be heard discussing Russian-U.S. relations. The video also highlights a book Vashukevich wrote titled Who Wants to Seduce a Billionaire.