Donald Trump's former campaign manager Paul Manafort has rejected a report that he is said to have met Wikileaks founder Julian Assange three times. "This story is completely false and intentionally slanderous," states a statement by Manafort about his lawyer Jason Maloni.
The British "Guardian" reported that Manafort met with Assange three times at the Ecuadorian embassy in London, most recently in March 2016. Weeks later, Wikileaks released emails from the US Democrats, Trump's then runaway candidate in the presidential race , Hillary Clinton, in a bad light. Donald Trump himself had repeatedly vowed in the election campaign Wikileaks, actually a red cloth for US security circles.
Manafort now examine all conceivable legal action against the British newspaper, it said in the statement. The latter had not withdrawn the story even when his representatives had warned the journalists that the report was flawed. Wikileaks had also denied the report.
US Special Agent Robert Mueller accused Manafort of having lied to the investigators in the Russia investigation. The ex-campaign manager had lied to the FBI and the Special Investigator's office on a number of issues - breaking his agreement with the judiciary, a court document released Monday night said. So far, it is unclear exactly what the suspected wrong statements related. Manafort also rejected these allegations.