- Oct 17, 2011
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The Italian government has determined that its intelligence services had no connection to a Maltese professor who told a Trump campaign adviser in 2016 that the Russian government had thousands of stolen emails that could damage Hillary Clinton’s candidacy, according to two senior Italian intelligence sources with knowledge of the matter.
In a series of meetings in Rome over the past two weeks, high-level Italian intelligence officials have repeatedly told cabinet members and a parliamentary oversight committee that the intelligence services did not have a relationship with Joseph Mifsud, a mysterious ex-diplomat who was a professor at a Rome university in 2016, the two sources told The Intercept.
Italian intelligence officials have quietly accused [newish Italian Prime Minister] Conte of trying to score political points with Trump by ordering his government to chase a conspiracy theory. In the days after [US Attorney General] Barr’s September visit to Rome, senior Italian intelligence officials were called to meetings with both the government and parliament’s intelligence oversight committee, which asked intelligence leaders about any contact they may have had with Mifsud.
While Barr was in Rome, Papadopoulos continued to assert that Mifsud was an Italian intelligence “operative handled by the CIA.” Italy, he said, held the “keys to the kingdom.” According to the Italian intelligence adviser, Mifsud didn’t work with or for either the country’s internal service, AISI, or the external service, AISE.
Italian intelligence officials have been dumbfounded, this person said, that the Conte government has asked them repeatedly for information about Mifsud. “This shows [Conte’s] inexperience, to accept the meeting with Barr,” the adviser said. “In that way, he’s like Trump.”
In a series of meetings in Rome over the past two weeks, high-level Italian intelligence officials have repeatedly told cabinet members and a parliamentary oversight committee that the intelligence services did not have a relationship with Joseph Mifsud, a mysterious ex-diplomat who was a professor at a Rome university in 2016, the two sources told The Intercept.
Italian intelligence officials have quietly accused [newish Italian Prime Minister] Conte of trying to score political points with Trump by ordering his government to chase a conspiracy theory. In the days after [US Attorney General] Barr’s September visit to Rome, senior Italian intelligence officials were called to meetings with both the government and parliament’s intelligence oversight committee, which asked intelligence leaders about any contact they may have had with Mifsud.
While Barr was in Rome, Papadopoulos continued to assert that Mifsud was an Italian intelligence “operative handled by the CIA.” Italy, he said, held the “keys to the kingdom.” According to the Italian intelligence adviser, Mifsud didn’t work with or for either the country’s internal service, AISI, or the external service, AISE.
Italian intelligence officials have been dumbfounded, this person said, that the Conte government has asked them repeatedly for information about Mifsud. “This shows [Conte’s] inexperience, to accept the meeting with Barr,” the adviser said. “In that way, he’s like Trump.”