It is not known what the primary reason was for Epstein’s planned trip to Moscow in 2010, but emails suggested he was going to meet women while there.<\/p>\n
On 9 November 2010, Epstein emailed Jean-Luc Brunel, a close associate and modelling agent, to let him know he was thinking of travelling to Moscow the following week.<\/p>\n
Brunel, who killed himself in 2022 while being investigated for the trafficking of minors for sexual exploitation, appeared to reply and said: “I am getting my visa”.<\/p>\n
Emails from the same day show that Epstein asked Mandelson, who had left government six months before, if he could help in acquiring a Russian visa.<\/p>\n
Epstein, who was in France, emailed Mandelson and said: “I do not have a visa for Russia, it is a bank holiday in paris today… any ideas how i can get one.”<\/p>\n
The documents released by the US Department of Justice suggest that Lord Mandelson replied hours later indicating that he was willing to help.<\/p>\n
At this point, Epstein had already served a prison sentence for soliciting prostitution with a minor.<\/p>\n
BBC News has seen no evidence to suggest that Mandelson asked why Epstein needed a visa to visit Russia at short notice.<\/p>\n
The following day, Mandelson emailed Epstein again and said that an associate of his was “helping on visas”.<\/p>\n
The days that Epstein wanted to travel to Moscow match up with email exchanges regarding obtaining a visa.<\/p>\n
On the same day that Epstein asked Mandelson for help, the financier sent an email to a woman in Russia asking if they had any “news?”.<\/p>\n
She replied later that day and said: “I really want to have someone very nice soon for you, working on it!”<\/p>\n
She added: “I have around 10 friends I’m working on now”.<\/p>\n
She also discussed a woman who they said would be “back in Moscow in a few days”.<\/p>\n
Three days later Epstein said to the woman he would be “back next week\/\/ any luck”.<\/p>\n
She replied and referred to what appears to be a 22-year-old woman who Epstein had previously indicated he had no interest in.<\/p>\n
She said: “I know you didn’t like photo of [redacted] 22, however if you change your mind let me know, she is a very very nice and sweet girl, just from Moscow. I’m 90 percent sure she will be interested.”<\/p>\n
She went on to describe another “gorgeous” woman who was “really interested”. They said they had “told her everything and she is completely fine”.<\/p>\n
Later that day she was sending a picture of another woman who “wants to be an actress, study design, was a gymnast”.<\/p>\n
She added that she had “interviewed” this woman, who she said was “really nice and interesting” and said they were “getting friendly with her and will have a talk soon!”.<\/p>\n
She also referenced a planned brunch with another person, who it appears Epstein had already received a photograph of.<\/p>\n
The email said: “she is bringing her girlfriend along, hopefully a good looking one! Will make photos.”<\/p>\n
She asked Epstein to “let us know what day you arrive so I’ll come with [redacted].”<\/p>\n
The email ended: “I am very excited about your guests, going to the gym now to be prepared!!!”.<\/p>\n
Epstein replied to say there was “no picture attached” and received a response: “sorry…here’s the picture! not the best one, so I also found some others on her facebook page.”<\/p>\n
Multiple emails suggest that Epstein planned to fly from Paris to Moscow in the days following this exchange.<\/p>\n
Emails also indicate that Mandelson visited Epstein in Paris on the day this exchange was sent.<\/p>\n
On 11 November, Epstein emailed his close friend Jes Staley to say that “petie [Mandelson], and others in paris this weekend”.<\/p>\n
On 12 November, Mandelson received an email with the subject “Paris” which read: “Hi peter, Valdson, Jeffrey’s driver, will be picking you up today from the train station… see you this evening!”<\/p>\n
There is no suggestion that Mandelson knew the reason Epstein wanted to visit Russia.<\/p>\n
The documents also show that the Moscow trip was ultimately cancelled because of delays in obtaining the necessary visas.<\/p>\n
On 15 November, an associate of Mandelson’s, who had been advising Epstein’s assistant on Russian visas, emailed to ask if they had obtained them yet.<\/p>\n
Epstein’s assistant replied and said the Moscow trip was no longer going ahead because it was “going to take too long to get visas in paris”.<\/p>\n
They added: “Thank you very much for all your help in this matter and sorry that it didn’t work out in the end!”<\/p>\n
Lord Mandelson has been approached for comment. He has previously said he was not complicit or culpable in Epstein’s crimes and has apologised to the women and girls who suffered.<\/p>\n
Jean-Luc Brunel always denied any wrongdoing.<\/p>\n
Being named in the Epstein files is not an indication wrongdoing.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"It is not known what the primary reason was for Epstein’s planned trip to Moscow in 2010, but…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":743000,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[12,26],"class_list":{"0":"post-742999","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-world","8":"tag-news","9":"tag-world"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@uk\/116015557754517237","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/742999","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=742999"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/742999\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/743000"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=742999"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=742999"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=742999"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}