Mueller releases memo summarising FBI interview with ex-NSA

Washington, Dec 18 (IANS) Special Counsel Robert Mueller has released a January 2017 memo detailing the FBI's interview that month with Michael Flynn, a moment that led to a high-profile criminal case against President Donald Trump's former National Security Adviser. According to the memo released on Monday night, Flynn in the interview lied about his contact during the presidential transition in 2016 with then-Russian ambassador to the US, Sergey Kislyak, CNN reported. At times, the former official offered the Federal Bureau of Investigation agents more benign descriptions of what he and Kislyak had said about Russian policy. The memo comes on the eve of Flynn's criminal sentencing for lying to investigators. Flynn pleaded guilty to lying to investigators in that interview and about his lobbying for the Turkish government. He will likely face zero to six months in prison, though Mueller's team has asked the judge to give him no prison time because he has helped their investigation, along with other federal probes. Meanwhile, a memo released by Mueller's office last week described how the FBI had known the facts of Flynn's conversations with Kislyak before the agency approached him in the West Wing.