Abramoff's Russia connections probed.

"The federal investigation into the lobbying activities of Jack Abramoff has broadened to examine his dealings with the Russian government and a pair of high-profile Russian energy company executives," reported the February 23 Boston Globe. A federal subpoena demands documents detailing Abramoff's involvement with "any department, ministry, or office holder or agent of the Russian government."

As noted by THE NEW AMERICAN in a recent cover story, Abramoff arranged a 1997 trip to Moscow by House Republican leader Tom DeLay (R-Texas). Abramoff's Russian clients, included Naftasib, an energy company intimately connected to Russian intelligence bodies (including the FSB, the renamed KGB) and the military. Those Russian concerns sought, and received, DeLay's support for a bill arranging a bailout of the Russian economy by the International Monetary Fund--at U.S. taxpayers' expense, naturally. The Globe points out that the super-lobbyist's Russian clients slopped huge sums of money into the "US Family Network," a nonprofit established by Abramoff supposedly to raise money for Evangelical Christian charities--but that actually was used as a slush fund for Abramoff and his cronies.