Russian arms deal
US remains silent
WASHINGTON — The U.S. edged closer to crisis Friday with NATO ally Turkey, which began receiving components of a Russian-made air defense system in defiance of Trump administration warnings that the deal would mean economic sanctions and no access to America’s most advanced fighter jet.
Despite the warnings, the administration was publicly silent on how it would respond to Turkey’s announcement Friday that it received the first shipment of the S-400 system.
The acting secretary of defense, Mark Esper, spoke by phone with his Turkish counterpart for 30 minutes, but the Pentagon declined to discuss the call.
Members of Congress, however, were quick to condemn.
“That a NATO ally would choose to side with Russia and Vladimir Putin over the alliance and closer cooperation with the United States is hard to fathom,” the Democratic chairman and the ranking Republican member of the House Foreign Affairs Committee said.
“Turkey and Erdogan must face stiff consequences for this decision,” the joint statement by Reps. Eliot L. Engel, a New York Democrat, and Rep. Michael McCaul, a Texas Republican, said, referring to Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan.
For months, Washington urged Turkey to buy the American-made Patriot air defense system instead and has insisted that buying from Russia would result in economic and military penalties. Turkey has said it was not offered favorable terms on the Patriot.
Among the U.S. penalties would be cutting Turkey out of the multi-national F-35 production program, depriving the Turks of the sophisticated stealth aircraft and the economic benefit of helping to build them.
The U.S. concern is that the S-400 could be used to gather data on the capabilities of the F35, and that the information could end up in Russian hands. But more than technology is at stake. Turkey has long been a key to the defense of NATO’s southeastern flank, and some believe its willingness to buy key weaponry from Russia — long identified as NATO’s main adversary — suggests the possibility that its alliance status is in jeopardy.
President Donald Trump recently expressed sympathy toward Turkey’s decision, although Erdogan has been told that the S-400 is incompatible with NATO air defense systems and is seen by alliance officials as a threat to the F-35.
In the Senate, too, Republicans and Democrats alike expressed dismay at the Turks’ move.
“By accepting delivery of the S-400 from Russia, President Erdogan has chosen a perilous partnership with Putin at the expense of Turkey’s security, economic prosperity and the integrity of the NATO alliance,” the top members of the Senate committees on Foreign Relations and Armed Services said.
Putin has long complained that NATO is designed to target Russia. Some see the sale as an attempt to drive a wedge between NATO allies.
NEW YORK (AP) — Federal prosecutors urged a judge Friday to keep financier Jeffrey Epstein behind bars until trial on sex trafficking charges involving underage girls, labeling him a “serial sexual predator” and saying he might try to influence witnesses after sending $350,000 recently to two individuals.
Prosecutors submitted written arguments in advance of a bail hearing Monday, saying he faces “the very real possibility” of spending the rest of his life in prison amid a “shocking lack of understanding” of the gravity of his crimes.
They said he also has a history of obstruction and manipulation of witnesses, including in the last year, and victims have told prosecutors they might be harassed or abused if he is freed.
“The defendant is a serial sexual predator who is charged with abusing underage girls for years,” prosecutors wrote. “And any doubt that the defendant is unrepentant and unreformed was eliminated when law enforcement agents discovered hundreds or thousands of nude and seminude photographs of young females in his Manhattan mansion on the night of his arrest, more than a decade after he was first convicted of a sex crime involving a juvenile.”
Prosecutors said evidence against Epstein has grown since his arrest last week after several additional women identified themselves to the government as victims and dozens of individuals called prosecutors to convey information about Epstein and his crimes.
They said victims support his detention and they know of no victim expressing support for bail.
Prosecutors also they were worried Epstein, 66, might try to derail his trial. They said Epstein recently paid $100,000 to one individual “named as a possible co-conspirator” in a non-prosecution agreement with federal prosecutors in Florida 12 years ago.
They said the payment, along with $250,000 sent to another person who was a former employee and was named as a possible co-conspirator in the non-prosecution agreement, came after the Miami Herald last November began publishing a series of articles describing the circumstances of his state court conviction in Florida in 2008 and the deal to avoid federal prosecution.
“This course of action, and in particular its timing, suggests the defendant was attempting to further influence co-conspirators who might provide information against him in light of the recently reemerging allegations,” prosecutor said.
They said he poses a “tremendous risk of flight and a danger to the community” and could easily continue earning over $10 million annually outside the United States.
The filing came a day after defense lawyers told U.S. District Judge Richard M. Berman that Epstein should be given bail and confined to his $77 million Manhattan mansion with electronic monitoring. Epstein pleaded not guilty Monday to charges alleging he recruited and abused dozens of underage girls at his mansions in New York and Palm Beach, Fla., in the early 2000s.