, emails show
Emails obtained by the State Department show that Devon Archer, who served on the board of the Ukrainian energy company Burisma, met with then-Secretary of State John Kerry just weeks before former Ukrainian Prosecutor General Victor Shokin was fired.
The emails were obtained through a freedom of information request filed by the conservative group Americans for Public Trust and were highlighted in a report from the Washington Examiner on Friday.
In the email exchanges, dated March 2 and March 15, 2016, Archer sent Kerry an email introducing himself and expressing his desire to meet with Kerry. Archer wrote that he had some “urgent matters” to discuss with Kerry regarding the situation in Ukraine and asked to be granted an audience with the Secretary of State.
The emails did not reveal the outcome of the requested meeting, but they did come just weeks before Shokin, who was accused of failing to adequately investigate corruption, was fired from his post on March 29, 2016. Shokin’s ouster is widely seen as a major accomplishment of the Obama administration in its efforts to combat corruption in Ukraine.
The emails highlighting Archer’s meetings with Kerry come as President Donald Trump and his allies seek to probe the former vice president’s connections with Burisma and the involvement of his son, Hunter Biden, in the company. In light of the emails, some are raising questions about whether Archer’s meetings with Kerry influenced the decision to remove Shokin.
