US ambassador wasted $1B in Somalia and is now funding a coup

[Geee]

Washington Examiner

Somalia descended into state failure in 1991, and famine quickly followed as warlords fought over the remnants of the country’s infrastructure. Television photos of starving children motivated the George H.W. Bush administration to provide aid and assistance. However, rather than rescue Somalis, humanitarian intervention ended up encouraging both warlords and venal politicians to fight over the assistance, or to use it to bolster patronage or deny food and assistance to their political rivals. 

 

While the Clinton administration abandoned Somalia after “the Black Hawk Down” episode, the United States has reengaged Somalia over the past decade. Former Secretary of State John Kerry became the first secretary of state in decades to visit Mogadishu when, in 2015, he landed and held meetings at the international airport which serves as Somalia’s “green zone.” 

The international community has doubled down on a plan to rebuild a Somali government, creating a timeline to one-man, one-vote popular elections that are set to occur this year, the first time Somalia would have such elections in more than a half-century.

Enter U.S. Ambassador to Somalia Donald Yamamoto, a longtime State Department Africa specialist who was previously ambassador to Ethiopia, Djibouti, and Eritrea, as well as acting assistant secretary of state for African affairs. Yamamoto crafted a strategy for the Horn of Africa which prioritized regional integration and Somali state-building. 

These are all noble goals, but Yamamoto has apparently become so invested in this strategy that he is unwilling to assess its success honestly.

[Geee]

Report: Missing $1.8 Billion in Aid Linked to Corrupt Oligarch Who ‘Bankrolled’ Ukraine Revolution

In a live video presentation, Thursday night, conservative radio host Glenn Beck accused the Obama administration of funneling $1.8 billion in taxpayer dollars to Ukraine in order to fund the Ukrainian revolution against Russia.

Calling the scandal bigger than the Reagan-era “Iran Contra” scandal, The Blaze founder said that his research team made the discovery while looking into the phone call between President Donald Trump and Ukrainian President Zelensky, which spurred the Democrats’ now-failed impeachment charade.

Beck explained that there were “things in the phone call that just didn’t make sense to us” and that prompted them to do a deep dive into what happened to the $1.8 billion in aid that went missing in PrivatBank, the largest commercial bank in Ukraine, which is owned by the corrupt oligarch Ihor Kolomoisky.