Clinton team hits report of Trump aide’s ties to Russia

Manafort’s name appears 22 times in 400 pages of handwritten Cyrillic taken from ledgers found at the headquarters of Yanukovych’s Regions Party, the Times writes.

While there is no evidence that Manafort has actually received the earmarked payments, he is “among those names on the list of so-called ‘black accounts of the Party of Regions, ‘ which the detectives of the National Anti-Corruption Bureau of Ukraine are investigating”, according to a statement from the bureau provided to the Times.

Richard A. Hibey, Manafort’s lawyer, told the New York Times, that these were nothing more than accusations and were likely motivated by the extremely contentious nature of the current election season.

Citing Ukraine’s National Anti-Corruption Bureau, the New York Times (NYT) reported the ledgers revealed some $12.7m (£9.8m) in undisclosed cash payments designated for Manafort from the Yanukovych administration between 2007 and 2012.

On a leafy side street off Independence Square in Kiev is an office used for years by Donald J. Trump’s campaign chairman, Paul Manafort, when he consulted for Ukraine’s ruling political party.

Adding to the intrigue are the circles in which the story is spreading.

Late on Sunday night, Hillary Clinton’s campaign manager, Robby Mook, released a statement in response to The Times story. “This suggestion that I accepted cash payments is unfounded, silly, and nonsensical”.

Allegations surrounding Manafort’s work in Ukraine are “especially troubling in light of the Russian government’s recently exposed cyber-attacks on the Democratic Party”, the committee said in a statement. “In addition, as the article points out hesitantly, every government official interviewed states I have done nothing wrong”. He also infamously called for Russian Federation to hack Hillary Clinton’s emails.

Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump took to Twitter on Sunday to hammer the “corrupt media” for its coverage of his campaign, singling out the New York Times as “failing”.

Lewandowski was sacked after clashing with Manafort over campaign strategy.

“The media is now focusing on a private person who had a private business model, which no one says there’s anything illegal about what he did”, he said on CNN. Number two, there’s no proof of any money received.

In the time period covered by the payment list, Manafort worked for former Ukrainian President Viktor F. Yanukovych, who was supportive of Russia’s Vladimir Putin and was ousted in 2014.

While employed by Yanukovych, Manafort never registered as a foreign agent with the United States Justice Department, something that would be required for anyone looking to influence American policy on behalf of a foreign client, something for which one of Manafort’s subcontractors did register.

Trump’s relationship with Russian Federation has drawn scrutiny throughout the campaign, most recently when he encouraged hackers from that country to find Clinton’s missing emails, an apparent invitation for a foreign power to intervene in a US election.