via US man pleads guilty for trying to influence Zim sanctions case Mail & Guardian 12 APR 2014 10:45 SAPA-AP
Prince Asiel Ben Israel faces a five-year prison sentences for trying to persuade US lawmakers to lift sanctions against Zimbabwe’s government.
A 72-year-old man has pleaded guilty to illegally lobbying lawmakers in the United States to lift sanctions against Zimbabwe’s president and other members of his regime for a promise of $3.4-million.
Prince Asiel Ben Israel entered his guilty plea Friday in a federal court in Chicago.
Prosecutors say he sought to persuade unnamed lawmakers to overturn sanctions against President Robert Mugabe and others in the southern African nation. The US imposed the sanctions in 2003 for alleged democratic violations.
The Chicago Sun-Times reports Ben Israel pleaded guilty to failing to register as an agent of Mugabe.
He faces a maximum five-year prison sentence. But under terms of his plea agreement, he can argue for probation at sentencing later this year.
A co-defendant, C. Gregory Turner, has maintained he did nothing illegal. –Sapa
COMMENTS
If bribery was one of ZANU PF’s strategies for countering sanctions in the US ( before Nikuv it seems we had the Chicago based “Black Hebrew Israelite” Prince Asiel Ben Israel (2008-9), one cannot help extrapolating. What strategy did they put in play for influencing the acceptance of their stolen 2013 victory in the Zuma administration, within SADC structures, including the Malawi-chairperson Joyce Banda, and even within the AU…? What of the MDC – some of whose leaders rarely speak of that infamous rigging now?
It’s all about money. Mugabe should be at the international court of justice period
Jesus said the father of all lies is the devil himself. he is who drives all this evil. may God’s righteous judgment fall and may He expose everything! Rwendo is right. All those people and institutions have been bought. They have sold their souls. I am disgusted! May God have mercy on Zimbabwe and pierce the darkness here
Ben Israel is a well known criminal.I hope he gets maximum.
Rwendo, our struggle was compromised once certain two money-hungry people were chosen to be our representatives during these so-called negotiations for GNU. Now they speak money.
Akagona akati: “The love of money is the root of all evil in this world.”