A Belarusian adult escort who worked for a Russian oligarch with ties to Trump campaign chief Paul Manafort told reporters Monday she has 16-plus hours of audio recordings that reveal Russia interference in the 2016 elections.
The 21-year-old Anastasia Vashukevich, who sometimes goes by Nastya Rybka, is seeking asylum in the United States and spoke to reporters from a jail cell in Bangkok, Thailand, where she was detained last month for allegedly working without a visa during a sex-training seminar in Pattaya. In 2016, Vashukevich says she spent time on the yacht of aluminum tycoon Oleg Deripaska, the man who Manafort owed millions to when he allegedly offered to brief Deripaska on the election while serving on Trump's campaign. The New York Times writes:
Ms. Vashukevich, who described herself as close to the Russian aluminum tycoon Oleg V. Deripaska, said that audio recordings she made in August 2016 included discussions he had about the United States presidential election with people she declined to identify. [...]
“If America gives me protection, I will tell everything I know,” Ms. Vashukevich said on Monday. “I am afraid to go back to Russia. Some strange things can happen.”
Her assertion could be easy to disregard were it not for a 25-minute video investigation posted last month on YouTube by the Russian opposition figure Aleksei A. Navalny, which relies heavily on videos and photographs from Ms. Vashukevich.
This story first surfaced last week but seems to have picked up more legitimacy over time as more threads get teased out. The video investigation posted by Navalny reportedly includes audio of Deripaska and a deputy prime minister of Russia discussing the relationship between Russia and the U.S.
In the interview at the immigration center on Monday, Ms. Vashukevich said that she had often recorded conversations between Mr. Deripaska and his associates, and that she had 16 to 18 hours of recordings, including conversations about the United States presidential election.
“They were discussing elections,” she said. “Deripaska had a plan about elections.”
Vashukevich believed some of the people she recorded were Americans but she is declining to reveal everything she knows unless she is granted asylum. One thing she's clearly right about: strange things do happen in Russia to people who pose political problems.