In this file photo taken on Nov 7, 2020, President-elect Joe Biden, right, embraces his son Hunter Biden, left, in Wilmington, Del. Biden's son Hunter says he has learned from federal prosecutors that his tax affairs are under investigation. (ANDREW HARNIK, POOL / AP)
The Russian government and media have alleged that the much-scrutinized laptop of Hunter Biden contains emails that connect the US president’s son to biological laboratories in Ukraine.
“An investment fund run by his (Joe Biden’s) son Hunter Biden funded research and the implementation of the United States’ military biological program. It is obvious that Joe Biden, as his father and the head of state, was aware of that activity,” Russian State Duma Speaker Vyacheslav Volodin said on March 24, according to Russian media.
Volodin called for a US congressional investigation and an explanation from the White House.
Igor Kirillov, head of Russia’s Radiation, Chemical and Biological Defense Forces, said at a briefing on March 24, “Incoming material allowed us to trace the interaction scheme between US government agencies and the Ukrainian biolab.”
US intelligence officials have dismissed Russia’s claims as war propaganda, saying that Ukraine’s network of biological labs researching pathogens was not secret and had publicly received funding from Washington.
Hunter Biden’s investment fund was involved in raising money for biolab projects in Ukraine, according to emails first obtained by the New York Post and initially reported by the UK’s Daily Mail on March 25.
Rosemont Seneca Technology Partners invested $500,000 in Metabiota, a pathogen research company headquartered in San Francisco, and raised millions more through firms that included Goldman Sachs, according to emails found on the computer, which was abandoned at a Wilmington, Delaware, repair shop in April 2019.
Rosemont Seneca is an investment company based in Washington, DC. It was founded in 2009 by Hunter Biden and business associates Christopher Heinz and Devon Archer.
The Post reported on the laptop after it received data from the computer from Rudy Giuliani, the former Republican mayor of New York and a legal adviser to former president Donald Trump, in October 2020.
Hunter Biden introduced Metabiota to officials at Burisma, the Ukrainian gas company where he was a highly paid board member, for a “science project” involving biolabs in Ukraine, according to the emails.
The company has worked in Ukraine for Black & Veatch, a US defense contractor with ties to military intelligence agencies, which built secure labs in Ukraine, according to the Daily Mail.
Metabiota’s then vice-president Mary Guttieri wrote to Hunter Biden about geopolitical issues involving the company’s research in the former Soviet republic in April 2014, two months after Russia annexed the Crimea region, according to the emails.
“As promised, I’ve prepared the attached memo, which provides an overview of Metabiota, our engagement in Ukraine, and how we can potentially leverage our team, networks, and concepts to assert Ukraine’s cultural and economic independence from Russia and continued integration into Western society,” her memo read.
Sam Faddis, a former senior CIA officer who reviewed the emails, told the Daily Mail that the offer to help drive Ukraine’s independence was unusual. “It raises the question. What is the real purpose of this venture?”
