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Thursday, 1 September 2022:
War in Ukraine: International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) mission inspects nuclear plant after delays, The Washington Post, Adela Suliman, John Hudson, Adam Taylor, Sammy Westfall, and James Bikales, Thursday, 1 September 2022: “An International Atomic Energy Agency team carried out an initial inspection of the Zaporizhzhia nuclear power plant Thursday, overcoming political hurdles and nearby mortar shelling to access the embattled plant. Five IAEA representatives will remain on-site through Saturday, the plant’s operator said. ‘I have just completed a first tour of the key areas that we wanted to see,’ Rafael Grossi, the director general of the IAEA, said on Twitter after leaving the facility Thursday evening. ‘We are establishing a continued presence from the IAEA here.’ The IAEA mission is intended to assess the safety and security of the Russian-occupied plant, as well as speak to staff, in a bid to prevent a nuclear disaster like the one that occurred in Chernobyl in 1986. Russia and Ukraine have accused each other of shelling the area around the power station.
- Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky praised the IAEA experts’ visit and called for demilitarization of the area around the plant in his nightly address Thursday. He accused Russia of efforts to ‘deceive the mission’ by intimidating local residents and refusing to allow journalists to accompany the inspectors. ‘The main thing is to have the will to draw objective conclusions,’ Zelensky said.
- The IAEA team pushed ahead with the visit despite what Grossi said was ‘increased military activity’ near the plant. The expert mission was briefly held up by Ukrainian forces on its way to the site. Russia has controlled the facility since March, and both Kyiv and Moscow publicly supported the visit by the United Nations’ nuclear watchdog.
- Lithuania offered to send its police forces to Zaporizhzhia as part of a U.N. peacekeeping force. Speaking at the U.N. Chiefs of Police Summit in New York Thursday, Arūnas Paulauskas, deputy commissioner of the Lithuanian police, said a U.N. police force could ensure the plant’s ‘physical security’ alongside a long-term IAEA monitoring mission. ‘Lithuania would be prepared to play an active part and deploy law enforcement officers to such a mission,’ he said.
- Ukraine began its academic school year Thursday, welcoming students back in ceremonies that showed both resilience and the war’s heavy toll. The Washington Post spoke to and photographed students and parents across the country to get a sense of the mood at the start of this unprecedented school year. Some students were required to carry ’emergency backpacks’ or practice air raid drills as part of their school’s opening ceremony. Others could not attend school in person because their school building had been bombed.
Russia-Ukraine War: Five U.N. Inspectors Remain at Embattled Nuclear Plant in Ukraine. Part of the I.A.E.A. mission departed the occupied Zaporizhzhia nuclear plant after roughly four hours, but others remain to continue assessing its safety. The New York Times, Thursday, 1 September 2022:
- The inspectors braved shelling as they crossed the front line between Ukrainian and Russian forces.
- With war raging near the plant, what can the U.N. inspectors accomplish?
- The Zaporizhzhia plant deployed emergency backup measures after it was struck by shelling.
- A Russian oil executive dies under murky circumstances.
- A Ukrainian player refused to shake the hand of the Belarusian she lost to at the U.S. Open.
- Improvements in U.N. security could help the nuclear agency as it navigates a combat zone in Ukraine.
- Pencil, chalk and first-aid kits: Ukrainian children return to school in the midst of war.
Trump Documents Inquiry: Federal Judge Aileen M. Cannon Keeps Door Open to Special Master in Trump Documents Inquiry. Cannon also indicated that she would unseal a more detailed inventory of the materials seized in the search of the former president’s Mar-a-Lago home. The New York Times, Patricia Mazzei, Alan Feuer, and Charlie Savage, Thursday, 1 September 2022: “A federal judge signaled on Thursday that she remained open to granting former President Donald J. Trump’s request to appoint an independent arbiter to go through documents the F.B.I. seized from him last month, but stopped short of making a final decision. After a nearly two-hour hearing, the judge, Aileen M. Cannon of the Federal District Court for the Southern District of Florida, reserved judgment on the question of whether to appoint a so-called special master in the case, saying she would issue a written order ‘in due course.’ Notably, Judge Cannon did not direct the F.B.I. to stop working with the files, which the Justice Department has said have already undergone a preliminary review by law enforcement officials. Judge Cannon, who was appointed by Mr. Trump in 2020, also indicated that she would unseal a more detailed list of the documents the F.B.I. took during its Aug. 8 search of Mar-a-Lago, Mr. Trump’s private club and residence in Florida. She had earlier ordered the Justice Department to provide the list to Mr. Trump’s legal team at its request. It was not clear when it would become public. During the hearing, Judge Cannon pressed the government to explain what harm could come from appointing a special master. Jay I. Bratt, the head of the Justice Department’s counterintelligence section, told her that a special master could slow down an assessment of the risk and damage to national security being conducted by the Office of the Director of National Intelligence — as well as an assessment of whether the seized documents contain the sort of national security secrets whose unauthorized retention is a crime under the Espionage Act.” See also, U.S. District Judge Aileen Cannon to issue a written ruling on Trump special-master request. Cannon indicates she may believe the former president retained some executive privileges when leaving the White House. The Washington Post, Perry Stein and Devlin Barrett, Thursday, 1 September 2022: “A federal judge seemed sympathetic to arguments presented by Donald Trump’s attorneys in a courtroom Thursday that the former president may retain some executive privileges after he left the White House. But U.S. District Judge Aileen M. Cannon did not issue a ruling from the bench on whether she would grant the legal team’s request to appoint a special master to review material seized from Trump’s Mar-a-Lago residence and club, instead saying she would deliver a written decision in ‘due course.’ Cannon also said she would unseal a more detailed inventory list of the documents and other materials that FBI agents seized from Mar-a-Lago on Aug. 8. Both the Justice Department and Trump’s lawyers have agreed that the information can be made public, potentially shedding light on what Trump kept in his possession after returning 15 boxes from Mar-a-Lago in January and responding to a May grand jury subpoena requesting additional presidential records. At a hearing Thursday afternoon, a newly hired Trump lawyer told Cannon that the appointment of a special master — essentially an independent outside expert — would bring down the ‘very high’ temperature around the FBI’s investigation into possible mishandling of classified documents. ‘We need to take a deep breath,’ said Chris Kise, a former Florida solicitor general who left his law firm this week and entered into a multimillion-dollar deal to join Trump’s legal team, according to people familiar with the arrangement who spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss it. Jay Bratt, a senior Justice Department counterintelligence official, told Cannon that Trump was not entitled to a special master, emphasizing that the issue in the case is the possible hiding of highly sensitive government secrets in a private residence. Trump ‘is no longer the president, and because he is no longer the president, he did not have the right to take those documents,’ Bratt said. Justice Department officials also told Cannon that their filter team had done a thorough review of the material, and it had set aside 64 sets of documents — made up of some 520 pages — that might be considered protected by attorney-client privilege.” See also, Federal judge Aileen Cannon orders release of detailed list of property seized in Trump FBI search, CBS News, Nicole Sganga, Robert Legare, Melissa Quinn, Thursday, 1 September 2022: “A federal judge on Thursday ordered the release of a detailed list of the property seized during the FBI’s search at former President Donald Trump’s South Florida residence last month, while reserving judgment on whether to appoint an outside party to review the documents. Federal prosecutors initially submitted a property receipt to the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of Florida on Tuesday, though it was filed under seal. The Justice Department told the court in a separate filing it was prepared to release the receipt to the public given the ‘extraordinary circumstances’ of the case and provide it ‘immediately’ to Trump. Trump’s legal team said they did not oppose unsealing the detailed inventory. It remained sealed as of Thursday afternoon.”
Continue reading Aftermath of the Trump Administration, September 2022: