Mystery Professor in Mueller Case Had Contacts With Russian Officials â Mother Jones
Joseph Mifsud
This mystery professor is likely  Joseph Mifsud of the University of Stirling in Scotland . According to a calendar entry on the Valdai clubâs website   Mifsud  spoke on a Valdai panel on April 19  2016  titled  âWorld Energy: Key Trends and Political Risks.â  Mifsud  grew up in the Mediterranean nation of Malta  where  he  served in various government posts;  he  was the only Londoner and the only professor on the panel. The Mueller legal filing revealed that Papadopoulos had extensive contacts with the professor as part of an effort to set up a meeting between Trump campaign representatives and Russian officials. Papadopoulos told his campaign supervisors about this effort and was encouraged to proceed. Papadopoulos has pleaded guilty to lying to the FBI about his communications with the professor and others connected to Russia.
The Washington Post noted on Monday that  Mifsud  is probably the professor cited in the Mueller statement. One of the emails quoted in the document  according to the Post  âappears to match one described to the Washington Post in August in which Papadopoulos identified the professor with whom he met as Joseph Mifsud  the director of the London Academy of Diplomacy.â But the Post reported that in August Mifsud told the newspaper he had âabsolutely no contact with the Russian government â and he insisted his ties to Russia were purely academic.
The public record  though  contains information contradicting  Mifsud  and showing that  he  has had contacts with Russian government officials. According to photos on the website of Russiaâs embassy in the United Kingdom   Mifsud  met with embassy representative Ernest Chernukhin in July of this year (weeks before  he  issued  his  denial to the Post). A biography from a 2013 business conference says  Mifsud  âhas advised Governments on international education issues in many countries including Morocco  Syria  Russia  Tunisia  and Italy.â  Mifsud  also met with Russian Ambassador to the UK Alexander Yakovenko in May of 2014  according to a 2014 Russian embassy press release.
Additionally  in early 2017   Mifsud  invited Alexey Klishin  a department head and professor in the international law division of the Moscow State Institute of International Relations  a school run by Russiaâs Foreign Ministry  to the London Academy of Diplomacy to present a lecture. Klishin was a former member of the upper house of the Russian parliament. According to a January 2017 press release from the Institution of the Russian Academy of Sciences  âKlishinâs presentation was devoted to international law and national legal systems [and] to their coexistence in the era of Brexit and the new presidency in the United States.â The release noted that Klishin had âvisited the London Academy of Diplomacy at the University of Stirlingâ¦at the invitation of  the Director Joseph Mifsud .â Hereâs a photo with  Mifsud  (second from the right) and Klishin (center) standing next to each other:
 Mifsud  did not respond to a request for comment from Mother Jones.
One obvious question for the professor is why he told the Post he had âabsolutelyâ no contacts with Russian officials when on-line material suggests he has. There are no indication in the Mueller statement whether his team has questioned  Mifsud  about the Clinton âdirtâ or Papadopoulosâs initiative to create a back-channel bond between the Trump campaign and Vladimir Putinâs office.
Thereâs another reason why  Mifsud  could be of interest to Mueller and his investigators. In the past year  the New York Times has reported that US intelligence agencies collected information in the summer of 2016 indicating that top Russian intelligence and political officials were looking to gain influence over Trump through his advisers and that US spy agencies had intercepted calls showing that Trump campaign aides and other Trump associates had repeated interactions with senior Russian intelligence officials  perhaps unwittingly. (In June  former FBI chief James Comey  in congressional testimony  disputed the Times story disclosing contacts between the Trump aides and Russian intelligence  but he did not specify what was wrong with the article.) So Mueller is no doubt looking for possible instances of when Russian intelligence infiltratedâor tried to infiltrateâthe Trump campaign  either directly or through witting or unwitting cut-outs. And the Papadopoulos episode could be a case not only of a Trump aide trying to establish a campaign connection with the Kremlin but of Russian intelligence attempting to score a contact within the Trump campaign.
This mystery professor is likely  Joseph Mifsud of the University of Stirling in Scotland . According to a calendar entry on the Valdai clubâs website   Mifsud  spoke on a Valdai panel on April 19  2016  titled  âWorld Energy: Key Trends and Political Risks.â  Mifsud  grew up in the Mediterranean nation of Malta  where  he  served in various government posts;  he  was the only Londoner and the only professor on the panel. The Mueller legal filing revealed that Papadopoulos had extensive contacts with the professor as part of an effort to set up a meeting between Trump campaign representatives and Russian officials. Papadopoulos told his campaign supervisors about this effort and was encouraged to proceed. Papadopoulos has pleaded guilty to lying to the FBI about his communications with the professor and others connected to Russia.
The Washington Post noted on Monday that  Mifsud  is probably the professor cited in the Mueller statement. One of the emails quoted in the document  according to the Post  âappears to match one described to the Washington Post in August in which Papadopoulos identified the professor with whom he met as Joseph Mifsud  the director of the London Academy of Diplomacy.â But the Post reported that in August Mifsud told the newspaper he had âabsolutely no contact with the Russian government â and he insisted his ties to Russia were purely academic.
The public record  though  contains information contradicting  Mifsud  and showing that  he  has had contacts with Russian government officials. According to photos on the website of Russiaâs embassy in the United Kingdom   Mifsud  met with embassy representative Ernest Chernukhin in July of this year (weeks before  he  issued  his  denial to the Post). A biography from a 2013 business conference says  Mifsud  âhas advised Governments on international education issues in many countries including Morocco  Syria  Russia  Tunisia  and Italy.â  Mifsud  also met with Russian Ambassador to the UK Alexander Yakovenko in May of 2014  according to a 2014 Russian embassy press release.
Additionally  in early 2017   Mifsud  invited Alexey Klishin  a department head and professor in the international law division of the Moscow State Institute of International Relations  a school run by Russiaâs Foreign Ministry  to the London Academy of Diplomacy to present a lecture. Klishin was a former member of the upper house of the Russian parliament. According to a January 2017 press release from the Institution of the Russian Academy of Sciences  âKlishinâs presentation was devoted to international law and national legal systems [and] to their coexistence in the era of Brexit and the new presidency in the United States.â The release noted that Klishin had âvisited the London Academy of Diplomacy at the University of Stirlingâ¦at the invitation of  [TGT] Mifsud  (second from the right) and Klishin (center) standing next to each other:
  [TGT] did not respond to a request for comment from Mother Jones.
One obvious question for the professor is why he told the Post he had âabsolutelyâ no contacts with Russian officials when on-line material suggests he has. There are no indication in the Mueller statement whether his team has questioned  Mifsud  about the Clinton âdirtâ or Papadopoulosâs initiative to create a back-channel bond between the Trump campaign and Vladimir Putinâs office.
Thereâs another reason why   [TGT] could be of interest to Mueller and his investigators. In the past year  the New York Times has reported that US intelligence agencies collected information in the summer of 2016 indicating that top Russian intelligence and political officials were looking to gain influence over Trump through his advisers and that US spy agencies had intercepted calls showing that Trump campaign aides and other Trump associates had repeated interactions with senior Russian intelligence officials  perhaps unwittingly. (In June  former FBI chief James Comey  in congressional testimony  disputed the Times story disclosing contacts between the Trump aides and Russian intelligence  but he did not specify what was wrong with the article.) So Mueller is no doubt looking for possible instances of when Russian intelligence infiltratedâor tried to infiltrateâthe Trump campaign  either directly or through witting or unwitting cut-outs. And the Papadopoulos episode could be a case not only of a Trump aide trying to establish a campaign connection with the Kremlin but of Russian intelligence attempting to score a contact within the Trump campaign.