​CHRONOLOGY How links between Giuliani and Hunter Biden with Romanian businessman sentenced for corruption evolved under media scrutiny

When Donald Trump’s lawyer Rudolph Giuliani promised new revelations on Biden-related deals in Romania last weekend, the media was lured to a piece by New York Times several months ago, which spoke of links between Joe Biden’s son Hunter with Romanian businessman Puiu Popoviciu, who has been sentenced to corruption. Giuliani himself established a link to Popoviciu a year ago.

• Here is a chronology of events in the Giuliani-Biden-Popoviciu issue

August, 2017.

• Romania’s high court sentenced businessman Puiu Popoviciu to 7 years under corruption charges in a real estate scandal related to a large plot of land north of Bucharest.
• On August 9, it was reported that Popoviciu was using the services of former FBI chief Louis Freeh company Freeh Goup International Solutions. The Group used a press release to voice disappointment with the verdict in Popoviciu’s case.

August 2018.

• Washington Post reported that Rudolph Giuliani was working for foreign clients both personally and through his company, while also acting as Trump’s personal lawyer.
• On August 27, Giuliani sent a letter to Romanian President Klaus Iohannis and other Romanian officials to claim that a series of protocols between prosecutors and intelligence services, which have been used in the fight against graft, were undermining the rule of law. Romania’s Ambassador to US George Maior, a former head of the Romanian Intelligence Service, called the letter „the expression of a lobby” in defending people who had faced the Romanian justice.
• Romanian authorities under then Social Democratic Party (PSD) leader Liviu Dragnea, himself the recipient of a corruption-related sentence at the time (he received another one and was sent to jail this year), used the letter to press Maior and point to „abuses” by the Justice system. The PSD was seeking to undermine the fight against corruption by all means at the time.
• The US, mainly through its Embassy, pointed out that Giuliani’s stance was not one of the US Government and that Giuliani did not hold any position within the state.
• Western media pointed out that Giuliani was paid by the Freeh Group, the company held by former FBI boss Louis Freeh.

May 2019.

• The first signs in the Biden-Ukraine scandal: Giuliani’s visit to Ukraine shortly after Vladimir Zelenskiy’s victory in presidential elections there was cancelled.
• In a report on Trump’s calls against critics, New York Times later reports that Hunter Biden, involved in the scandal, also provided counsel for Gabriel Popoviciu.

October 2019.

• The scandal in Washington reaches a point where Donald Trump accuses a coup d’etat against him and Giuliani on Fox News threatens with further revelations about Biden – this time about Romania.

Full chronological report in Romanian