Automatically translated version. May contain inaccuracies compared to the original.
It was Umar Kremlyov, who previously paid part of his wedding.
Donald Trump Jr. traveled this summer on a multi-day hunting trip to Mongolia with Umar Kremlyov, a businessman with ties to Vladimir Putin who has a criminal past, who financed his wedding in the spring. As reported by the Financial Times, this trip underscores unusual ties between the president’s son and a businessman with close connections to the personal security service of the Russian president.
The publication writes that the details of this joint trip were confirmed to them by guides and local officials, and the trip was verified by flight-tracking data, social media posts, and open sources.
Yes, one of the guides said that during the trip Trump Jr. hunted one Altai argali — a type of sheep endangered and valued for its enormous horns.
“Don clearly indicated that he has personal, friendly relations with Umar, not business ones,” said a spokesperson for Trump Jr., adding that they first met through a mutual friend from the hunting world. “Their friendship largely rests on a shared passion for hunting, fishing, and outdoor recreation. It should come as no surprise that this year they went hunting together,” he noted.
At the same time, intelligence experts note that such relationships are vulnerable to manipulation.
“In reality, it doesn’t matter if people have the purest intentions. As soon as Russian security and intelligence services learn that someone has ties to a high-ranking person, they will try to use it as a weapon,” said former head of counterintelligence at the National Security Council Holden Triplett.
The trip took place after Kremlyov visited and partially paid for Trump Jr.’s wedding on a private island in the Caribbean in May. After the disclosure of this information, in the fall the U.S. president stated that his son reimbursed Kremlyov’s expenses.
At the end of August, Trump Jr. flew to Ulaanbaatar, the capital of Mongolia, and drove hundreds of miles to a camp in the Uvs province, where he lived with a small group of hunting guides, drivers, and cooks.
As a member of the presidential family, he travels under Secret Service protection. According to federal documents, the U.S. Embassy in Ulaanbaatar paid 18 715 dollars for hotel accommodation in connection with an indeterminate “visitation” of the Secret Service from 23 to 6 August.
As of 27 August, Umar Kremlyov, who is president of the International Boxing Association (IBA), left the IBA event in Kazakhstan and by night flew on a charter jet to Ulaanbaatar. After that he proceeded to Trump Jr.’s camp. He was accompanied by Russian businessman Artur Martirosov, a partner in the venture fund “Voskhod,” which is under U.S. sanctions.
One of the local participants of the trip told FT that Trump Jr. and Kremlyov watched to ensure they were not photographed together during their stay at the camp.
Kremlyov posted a video on Telegram showing his group preparing for hunting at dawn. Trump Jr. does not appear in it, though two of the event organizers are visible.
Umar Kremlyov has carried the name Umar Lutfulloyev since birth and was convicted of extortion and causing bodily harm. In 2010, he changed his Tajik surname and began a new page of his life as a boxing promoter.
In 2017 he headed the Russian Boxing Federation, and in 2020 he was elected president of the IBA, which brought funding to the federation from the Russian state company Gazprom. Subsequently he repeatedly traveled around the world as part of Vladimir Putin’s delegation.
After the hunting trip in Mongolia, Kremlyov returned to Russia, while Trump Jr. stayed for another week, traveling from Uvs to Bayan-Ölgiy to hunt the Altai ibex — a wild goat species also endangered.
Among the participants of Trump Jr.’s hunting trip, the publication names longtime sponsor of the Republican Party Kevin Small and Kazakh influencer in travel Dastan Mukhamedrakim.
Meanwhile, after hunting the mountain goat and a photo shoot with a golden eagle, Trump Jr. returned to the capital of Mongolia, where he held a series of meetings. One of them was a dinner with the President of Mongolia, Ukhnaagiin Khurelsukh. The government spokesperson posted photos on Facebook and wrote that they discussed U.S.–Mongolia relations and potential business opportunities. However, the post was soon deleted.
Trump Jr.’s spokesman said that it was an unofficial meeting during which they mostly discussed outdoor recreation.
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