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The newspaper said it is unclear “why Manafort wanted to see Assange and what was discussed.”
Citing a “well-placed source,” The Guardian reported that Manafort met with Assange around March 2016, just months before WikiLeaks released Democratic emails believed to be stolen by Russian intelligence officers.
Manafort, the newspaper reported, denied having any involvement in the hack and his lawyers declined to answer the Guardian’s questions about the visits. Jennifer Robinson, Assange’s UK-based counsel, told CNN “no such meetings took place.”
“We have had no contact with the Mueller investigation,” she added.
WikiLeaks denied the report shortly after it was published.
“Remember this day when the Guardian permitted a serial fabricator to totally destroy the paper’s reputation. @wikileaks is willing to bet the Guardian a million dollars and its editor’s head that Manafort never met Assange.”
Barry J. Pollack, an attorney for Assange who was in federal court in Virginia for an unrelated issue Tuesday, said he didn’t “know whether that’s accurate or not” when asked about the meetings detailed in the report.
The newspaper also reported that an internal document written by Ecuador’s intelligence agency and seen by The Guardian contains Manafort’s name on a list of “well-known” guests at the embassy in 2013. The list, according to the newspaper, also mentions “Russians.”
Manafort pleaded guilty to conspiracy and witness tampering on September 14, almost a year after he was first charged and following his conviction by a jury in a separate but related case on eight tax and banking crimes.
CNN’s Kara Scannell and Laura Jarrett contributed to this report.
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