A high-ranking Russian law official believed to be the authority behind attorney Natalia Veselnitskaya, who took part in the notorious Trump Tower meeting with Donald Trump Jr during the presidential campaign, has been killed in a mysterious helicopter crash.
Long-time ally of President Vladimir Putin ally, Saak Karapetyan, died last night when his AS-350 came down in Kostroma region northeast of Moscow during an unauthorized flight.
Until his death Karapetyan, was Deputy prosecutor-general for the country.
In that capacity Karapetyan had been in charge of Russian criminal investigations into the poisoning of former spy Sergei Surinam and his daughter Yulia in the UK, and the deaths of Putin critic Boris Berezovsky and of dissident Alexander Litvinenko.
Karapetyan was closely tied to Natalia Veselnitskaya, the Russian lawyer variously mentioned as leading  Russia’s contigent to the Trump Tower meeting, whose purpose allegedly was to share dirt on Democratic candidate, Hillary Clinton and provide assistance to the Trump campaign.
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Karapetyan reportedly, also directed Veselnistkaya in her efforts to convince governments around the world to overturn anti-corruption laws targeting Russians passed after tax accountant Sergei Magnitsky was beaten to death in a Moscow prison in 2009 while working to expose a $230million fraud scheme in the country.
The US Magnitsky Act, championed by the late accountant’s client, American-born British financier and human rights advocate Bill Browder, was signed into law by then-President Barack Obama in 2012.
The law authorizes the government to sanction Russian human rights offenders, freeze their assets, and ban them from entering the US.

Karapetyan was one of three people who died when the AS-350 helicopter came down in Kostroma region northeast of Moscow last night

It’s been widely reported that Putin has been aggressively pursuing a vendetta against Browder over the Magnistky laws, so much so that during the infamous press conference with Trump in Helsinki, Finland, earlier this year, he publicly accused Browder of committing tax evasion and contributing $400million to Clinton’s campaign.
According to reporting by The Daily Beast, in 2014, Karapetyian signed a letter sent on behalf of the Kremlin to an American court, refusing to help with a civil lawsuit concerning Magnitsky’s death. A letter widely believed to have been composed with Veselnistkaya’s input.
Kremlin connected attorney, Natalie Veselnitskaya, claimed she and Donald Trump Jr discussed the prospect of overturning the Magnitsky Act, ostensibly the sole reason behind the Trump Tower meeting.
Five months before Election Day, on June 9, 2016, Veselnistkaya led a Kremlin delegation to meet in Trump Tower, New York City, with Trump campaign officials including The candidate’s son Donald Trump Jr, his son-in-law Jared Kushner, campaign chairman Paul Manafort and others.
It has been alleged that then-candidate Trump’s surrogates agreed to meet with the Russian lawyer because they were promised compromising information about Clinton provided to Veselnistkaya by Kaarapetyian’s office, according to leaked emails of introduction.

Russian attorney Natalia Veselnitskaya said she and Donald Trump Jr discussed the prospect of overturning the Magnitsky Act. Skeptical US authorities believe the meeting was mainly scheduled to discuss Clinton compromat [incriminating materials] aimed at derailing the democrat

Trump Jr has vehemently denied that the meeting had anything to do with ‘dirt’ on the Democratic candidate, instead claiming that its focus was Russian adoption policy.
Veselnistkaya has offered a different version of events, publicly claiming that she and Trump campaign officials talked about the prospect of overturning the Magnitsky Act.
‘[I]f we come to power, we can return to this issue and think what to do about it. I understand our side may have messed up, but it’ll take a long time to get to the bottom of it,’ she recalled Trump Jr telling her, in an interview with Bloomberg News.
The meeting in Trump Tower is currently at the center of special counsel Robert Mueller’s ongoing investigation into allegations of collusion between the Trump campaign and Russia and interference by the Kremlin in the 2016 election.
President Trump has repeatedly and vociferously denied colluding with the Kremlin. He has described the Mueller as a ‘witch hunt’ in countless tweets.

Russian spies were outed by Dutch security who were about to release the names of Aleksei Morenets, Evgenii Serebriakov, Oleg Sotnikov and Alexey Minin who entered the Netherlands  on diplomatic passports to launch cyberattacks

The helicopter crash that ended the life of Veselnitskaya’s suspected handler, Karapetyan, came just hours before four Russian intelligence officers were outed by the Dutch government as having tried to hack the global chemical weapons watchdog OPCW in The Hague in April, shortly after the Novichok nerve agent attack in Salisbury, UK.
It was claimed Friday that ‘his death will resolve a number of very painful issues’ in the Russian government.
An anonymous insider posted on a channel on the popular Telegram messaging app called NeZygar that Karapetyan’s death ‘will stop leaks of highly confidential information to the West’.
The insider claimed it would specifically prevent leaks to the secret services of Britain, the US and Switzerland, and stop attacks on Putin’s security council chief Nikolai Patrushev.

NeZygar, a ‘blog channel’ has 93,000 subscribers and has previously proven to be a well informed insider.
Karapetyan was one of three people who died in the crash some 65 miles north east of Moscow last night.
The pilot who died, named as  Stanislav Mikhnov, 54, was described as highly experienced in Russian media.
‘The wreckage of the helicopter was found near the village of Vonyshevo, the aircraft was burned,’ added an emergencies ministry source cited by Tass.
‘The debris of the crashed helicopter have been found. Three people died in that crash.
‘Their bodies were also found at the crash site,’ the source said.
The Investigative Committee has launched a criminal probe into the helicopter crash, it was announced.