"It was obvious that this event had a very traumatic effect on (Reade), and that she is still sensitive and effected (sic) by it today," Dronen wrote.

Former director of national intelligence James Clapper in 2018 said that he hadn't seen evidence that the Trump presidential campaign colluded with Russia to win the 2016 general election.Clapper was responding to a query from then-representative Tom Rooney, a Florida Republican, during an interview before the House Intelligence Committee. The transcript of the interview was released on Thursday."I never saw any direct empirical evidence that the Trump campaign or someone in it was plotting [or] conspiring with the Russians to meddle with the election," Clapper said."That's not to say that there weren't concerns about the evidence we were seeing, anecdotal evidence…[redacted]," Clapper added. "But I do not recall any instance when I had direct evidence of the content of these meetings. It's just the frequency and prevalence of them was of concern."Rooney then asked Clapper, "At what time is collusion collusion, and at what time is it just people that may have an affiliation with the campaign meeting or talking with… the Russian ambassador or somebody that's of Russian origin, and when should that be taken as something that rises to the level of an Intelligence Community concern?""I really can't answer it other than the sort of visceral reaction to why all these meetings with the Russians," Clapper responded. Clapper admitted that it would be "legitimate" for incoming Trump administration officials to meet with representatives of Russia, "but I think there is a line…between that and violating the principle that in this country we traditionally have one President and one administration at a time."The interview was part of a set of 53 transcripts of interviews held by the House Intelligence Committee as part of the Russia investigation. Current committee chairman Adam Schiff had called for the release of the transcripts in 2018.However, after 43 transcripts had been reviewed and redacted by intelligence agencies as of June 2019, Schiff refused to relase the completed transcripts to the public. Current acting DNI head Richard Grenell informed Schiff on Wednesday that all the transcripts were ready for publication.

WASHINGTON -- The Justice Department's decision to drop the criminal case against Michael Flynn, President Donald Trump's former national security adviser, even though he had twice pleaded guilty to lying to investigators, was extraordinary and had no obvious precedent, a range of criminal law specialists said Thursday."I've been practicing for more time than I care to admit and I've never seen anything like this," said Julie O'Sullivan, a former federal prosecutor who now teaches criminal law at Georgetown University.The move is the latest in a series that the department, under Attorney General William Barr, has taken to undermine and dismantle the work of the investigators and prosecutors who scrutinized Russia's 2016 election interference operation and its links to people associated with the Trump campaign.The case against Flynn for lying to the FBI about his conversations with the Russian ambassador was brought by the office of the former special counsel, Robert Mueller. It had become a political cause for Trump and his supporters, and the president had signaled that he was considering a pardon once Flynn was sentenced. But Barr instead abruptly short-circuited the case.On Thursday, Timothy Shea, the interim U.S. attorney in the District of Columbia, told the judge overseeing the case, Emmet G. Sullivan, that prosecutors were withdrawing the case. They were doing so, he said, because the department could not prove to a jury that Flynn's admitted lies to the FBI about his conversations with the ambassador were "material" ones.The move essentially erases Flynn's guilty pleas. Because he was never sentenced and the government is unwilling to pursue the matter further, the prosecution is virtually certain to end, although the judge must still decide whether to grant the department's request to dismiss it "with prejudice," meaning it could not be refiled in the future.A range of former prosecutors struggled to point to any previous instance in which the Justice Department had abandoned its own case after obtaining a guilty plea. They portrayed the justification Shea pointed to -- that it would be difficult to prove to a jury beyond a reasonable doubt that the lies were material -- as dubious."A pardon would have been a lot more honest," said Samuel Buell, a former federal prosecutor who now teaches criminal law at Duke University.The law regarding what counts as "material" is extremely forgiving to the government, Buell added. The idea is that law enforcement is permitted to pursue possible theories of criminality and to interview people without having firmly established that there was a crime first.James G. McGovern, a defense lawyer at Hogan Lovells and a former federal prosecutor, said juries rarely bought a defendant's argument that a lie did not involve a material fact."If you are arguing 'materiality,' you usually lose, because there is a tacit admission that what you said was untrue, so you lose the jury," he said.No career prosecutors signed the motion. Shea is a former close aide to Barr. In January, Barr installed him as the top prosecutor in the district that encompasses the nation's capital after maneuvering out the Senate-confirmed former top prosecutor in that office, Jessie K. Liu.Soon after, in an extraordinary move, four prosecutors in the office abruptly quit the case against Trump's longtime friend Roger Stone. They did so after senior Justice Department officials intervened to recommend a more lenient prison term than standard sentencing guidelines called for in the crimes Stone was convicted of committing -- including witness intimidation and perjury -- to conceal Trump campaign interactions with WikiLeaks.It soon emerged that Barr had also appointed an outside prosecutor, Jeff Jensen, the U.S. attorney in St. Louis, to review the Flynn case files. The department then began turning over FBI documents showing internal deliberations about questioning Flynn, like what warnings to give -- even though such files are usually not provided to the defense.Flynn's defense team has mined such files for ammunition to portray the FBI as running amok in its decision to question Flynn in the first place. The questioning focused on his conversations during the transition after the 2016 election with the Russian ambassador about the Obama administration's imposition of sanctions on Russia for its interference in the American election.The FBI had already concluded that there was no evidence that Flynn, a former Trump campaign adviser, had personally conspired with Russia about the election, and it had decided to close out the counterintelligence investigation into him. Then questions arose about whether and why Flynn had lied to administration colleagues like Vice President Mike Pence about his conversations with the ambassador.Because the counterintelligence investigation was still open, the bureau used it as a basis to question Flynn about the conversations and decided not to warn him at its onset that it would be a crime to lie. Notes from Bill Priestap, then the head of the FBI's counterintelligence division, show that he wrote at one point about the planned interview: "What's our goal? Truth/admission or to get him to lie, so we can prosecute him or get him fired?"Barr has also appointed another outside prosecutor, John H. Durham, the U.S. attorney in Connecticut, to reinvestigate the Russia investigators even though the department's independent inspector general was already scrutinizing them.And his department has intervened in a range of other ways, from seeking more comfortable prison accommodations last year for Paul Manafort, Trump's former campaign chairman, to abruptly dropping charges in March against two Russian shell companies that were about to go to trial for financing schemes to interfere in the 2016 election using social media.Barr has let it be known that he does not think the FBI ever had an adequate legal basis to open its Russia investigation in the first place, contrary to the judgment of the Justice Department's inspector general.In an interview on CBS News on Thursday, Barr defended the dropping of the charges against Flynn on the grounds that the FBI "did not have a basis for a counterintelligence investigation against Flynn at that stage."Anne Milgram, a former federal prosecutor and former New Jersey attorney general who teaches criminal law at New York University, defended the FBI's decision to question Flynn in January 2017. She said that much was still a mystery about the Russian election interference operation at the time and that Flynn's lying to the vice president about his postelection interactions with a high-ranking Russian raised new questions.But, she argued, the more important frame for assessing the dropping of the case was to recognize how it fit into the larger pattern of the Barr-era department "undercutting the law enforcement officials and prosecutors who investigated the 2016 election and its aftermath," which she likened to "eating the Justice Department from the inside out."This article originally appeared in The New York Times.(C) 2020 The New York Times Company

The Iranian president said Wednesday that lifting a U.N. arms embargo on Tehran would be an “obvious right” and added a veiled warning of unspecified steps Iran could take if the embargo is extended, as the United States wants.

Abayev and members of his search team rummage the steppe for remains of the Red Army soldiers who fell in the autumn of 1942 in fierce fighting with Nazi troops pushing toward the Caspian Sea south of Stalingrad. Stiff resistance by the Red Army stopped the Wehrmacht onslaught in the steppes of Kalmykia, and months later the enemy's forces were encircled in Stalingrad and surrendered, a major defeat for the Nazis that marked a turning point in World War II.

The diagnosis brings the threat of infection into the president's inner circle.

At the Springplank school in the Dutch city of Den Bosch, staff have installed plastic shields around students' desks and disinfectant gel dispensers at the doorways as part of preparations to reopen amid the country's coronavirus outbreak. New infections in the Netherlands have been declining for weeks, and the government on Wednesday announced a schedule to relax some of its lockdown measures, with elementary schools to reopen on May 11. "Our teachers are not worried," said Rascha van der Sluijs, the school's technical coordinator.

Biden has repeatedly denied Reade's allegation.

Are dentists open for emergency care, and other questions answered by BBC experts.

Ministers have set targets for testing, medical equipment and hospital beds. Have they delivered?

Labour's General Secretary Jennie Formby standing down is a sign the party is under new management.

The Foreign Secretary says the prime minister will outline what steps the UK "can responsibly take over the following weeks."

Vulnerable children and victims of domestic violence and modern slavery will get extra support.

Boris Johnson says doctors had planned what to do if his coronavirus treatment went "badly wrong".

Transport Secretary Grant Shapps says it could help maintain social distancing on public transport.

A large zoo says it needs government grants as it has no visitors or income but still has to look after its animals.

Ministers say they will drive a "hard bargain" but Labour say they must be "wary" of President Trump.

The former Unite official says it is the "right time" to move on with the party under new leadership.

The Irish deputy PM says time is short to reach a trade deal this year, with much still to do.

Labour's Dr Rosena Allin-Khan questions Health Secretary Matt Hancock in the House of Commons.

Leaked letter from shadow minister reveals attempt to impose discipline on top team, writes Iain Watson.

The UK's chief scientist tells MPs mass testing is "part of the system that you need to get right".

The NI Executive says agreeing how to relax measures is the most crucial decision it will ever make.

Bank head Andrew Bailey tells the BBC there will be no quick return to normality after the hit to jobs and income.

Almost half a million people are at "high risk" of homelessness, local councils warn government.

Leave campaigners were accused by the Electoral Commission of breaking the law over spending limits.

As his great grandson launches a competition to "inspire like Churchill", we look at the PM's wartime words.

From boosting the economy through to health benefits, Westminster has been talking up the measure.

Foundling Paul Fronczak was given to a family whose baby had been stolen - but was he really their son?

Some governments want to channel their economic recovery plans into low-carbon industries.

Photographers who work for Unicef have taken candid shots of their children's lives during lockdown.

Against her will, Sita Tyasutami became "case one", the face of Indonesia's coronavirus outbreak.

In states like Texas, malls can operate at a 25% capacity and for some, it's a reason to get out of the house.

The controversial concept of B teams may be back on the agenda as football tries to navigate a way through Covid-19, Brighton technical director Dan Ashworth says.

Mercedes driver Lewis Hamilton says he feels certain benefits from his enforced time away from Formula 1.

Teams will be allowed to use five substitutes when the season resumes after a Fifa proposal to help with fixture congestion was approved.

Watford become the third team to publicly oppose the use of neutral venues when Premier League football returns.

The band's influence can be heard in everything from art-rock and hip-hop to trance and house.

The lockdown has led to huge growth in the number of people buying garden seeds.

One man's dream sailing trip nearly ended in disaster as island nations began closing their borders.

Women post selfies demanding more representation in official bodies dealing with Covid-19.

The self-styled "king and queen of rock 'n' roll" - who inspired Elvis and The Beatles - dies at 87.

The 25-year-old was jogging in Georgia when he was shot dead, in a video the president described as disturbing.

An airline industry body says it has been told coronavirus quarantining will start from the end of May.

The diagnosis comes one day after Trump's personal valet tested positive for the virus.

Thousands accused PM Janez Jansa of using the coronavirus crisis as a pretext to restrict freedoms.

More than 650,000 watch the Gollum actor narrate Tolkien's fantasy classic in one 11-hour sitting.

Andrew's mother was dying in hospital under lockdown, so he used technology to spend time with her.

The UK is testing its own design but a Google-Apple initiative is winning over many other nations.

More than 160,000 suspicious emails have been reported to a new scam-busting service in two weeks.