MELCHIOR WATHELET, THE GLADIO – ADVOCATE-GENERAL OF EUROPEAN COURT IN ROSNEFT SANCTIONS CASE WORKED WITH SECRET NATO SPY AND TERROR RING AGAINST RUSSIA; ROSNEFT LAWYERS IN SANCTIONS CASE INCLUDE US SPY
By John Helmer, Moscow
Melchior Wathelet (lead image, left), the Advocate-General of the European Court in Luxembourg, publicly recommended on May 31 that the court should dismiss a challenge to the legality of European Union sanctions by the Russian state oil company Rosneft. Wathelet has a history of secret operations against Moscow. That history ought to have disqualified Wathelet from participating in the Rosneft case, lawyers at the court say. “He should have done so voluntarily,” one of the lawyers adds. “Instead, Wathelet, along with the Belgian President of the Court, Koen Lenaerts, have kept the past secret, allowing a serious conflict of interest to influence the outcome of the case.”
As the minister of justice in his native Belgium, Wathelet supervised the Belgian state security service, and officially participated himself over several years in NATO spying, military operations and propaganda schemes against Russia and the Soviet Union. Details of Wathelet’s involvement in NATO’s Operation Gladio were not known to Rosneft when Wathelet was assigned to the case. Rosneft’s Anglo-American law firm did not investigate Wathelet’s bacckgournd. Also, the law firm, Hage Joseph Aaronson, has kept from Rosneft the knowledge that one of their own lawyers was a long-serving officer in the US Defence Intelligence Agency.
Lawyers engaged in European Court cases in Luxembourg say they are astonished by the conflict of interest. “This case is hugely important,” said one source engaged in a parallel sanctions proceeding. “If Rosneft were to win, the legality of sanctions would collapse”. A London lawyer adds he is surprised that Rosneft management and its lawyers in Luxembourg failed to challenge Wathelet’s participation in the case.
Wathelet is not denying the information about his past involvement in NATO operations. He won’t explain why he and the presiding judge, Court President Koen Lenaerts, acted together to arrange his assessment of the Rosneft legal papers.
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