I got a tip maybe two, three years ago that Curt Weldon and some other politicians had a substantial off-the-books financial interest in the American subsidiary of a Russian oil company - probably Lukoil, according to my source. I could never confirm it - I had neither the time nor the resources.

So naturally I’m interested in this news, which I missed yesterday:

WASHINGTON - The Justice Department is investigating whether Republican Rep. Curt Weldon of Pennsylvania traded his political influence for lucrative lobbying and consulting contracts for his daughter, according to sources with direct knowledge of the inquiry.

The FBI, which opened an investigation in recent months, has formally referred the matter to the department’s Public Integrity Section for additional scrutiny. At issue are Weldon’s efforts between 2002 and 2004 to aid two Russian companies and two Serbian brothers with ties to strongman Slobodan Milosevic, a federal law enforcement official said.

The Russian companies and a Serbian foundation run by the brothers’ family each hired a firm co-owned by Weldon’s daughter, Karen, for fees totaling nearly $1 million a year, public records show.

Here’s where it gets interesting:

What caused Karen Weldon to set up a lobbying firm is unclear. The Times reported that Philadelphia lawyer John Gallagher, who has worked with Representative Weldon on building relations with Russia, took credit for delivering Sexton and Weldon their first client: the Moscow-based Itera energy group.[...]

Two months before Weldon’s visit, the U.S. Trade and Development Agency scrapped plans to award an $868,000 grant to Itera to study gas deposits in Russia because the firm refused to identify all of its owners.

But Weldon, at a news conference after returning from Russia, called on the Bush administration to release the grant. The Philadelphia Inquirer reported in 2004 that Weldon also complained to presidential adviser Karl Rove and to then-energy secretary Spencer Abraham about the company’s treatment by the U.S. government. The grant was never approved.

Now look at this, which may or may not be related:

The ownership of Gazprom remains a mystery to the press today. “Many analysts–and at least one official inquiry–believe that Itera [International Energy Corporation, with offices in Jacksonville, Florida] and these other companies in Gazprom’s close orbit are owned by Gazprom’s management or their relatives.” Charles Clover, “Gazprom’s sweetheart reaps Arctic Russia’s riches: A company of uncertain ownership has been very well treated by the gas monopoly,” FIN. TIMES, Aug. 11, 2000, p. 3. See also David Hoffman, “Itera: Mystery Player in Russia’s Natural Gas Market,” WASH. POST, May 21, 2000, p. H1.

While it is generally accepted by analysts that Chernomyrdin became extremely wealthy thanks to his Gazprom connections, the Russian energy industry does not appreciate such publicity. In April 1997, Izvestia republished a Le Monde report that Chernomyrdin had amassed a personal fortune of $5 billion in connection with “privatization.” In an example of the extraordinary ties between the energy and media sectors in Russia, after Izvestia’s publication of this report, the petroleum giant Lukoil, a major Izvestia shareholder, “promptly called an extraordinary shareholders meeting, took a majority on the newspaper’s board, and sacked its top editors.”

Andrew McChesney, “Paper Says Lukoil Menaced Reporter,” MOSCOW TIMES, Feb. 1, 2000; Daniel Williams, “‘Citizen Kane’ on Pushkin Square: Rough Politics, Secret Deals End in Corporate Coup at Russia’s Izvestia Newspaper and De Facto Dismissal of Longtime Editor,” L.A. TIMES, July 13, 1997.

Former Russian Finance Minister Boris Fyodorov had written in Izvestia May 26, 1995 that Chernomyrdin had acquired 1% of the stock in Gazprom, a company that could be worth $700 billion. See Peter Reddaway, “Is Chernomyrdin a Crook?” POST-SOVIET PROSPECTS, Vol. III, No. 8, August 1995, at http://www.csis.org/ruseura/psp/pspiii8.html (Reddaway was the director of the Kennan Institute for Advance Russian Studies; a shorter version of the paper was published in the Washington Post, Aug. 20, 1995.).See Chapter 6 supra.

Well, you know what the nuns always used to say: Lie down with dogs, rise up with fleas. Looks like Wacky Curt may soon develop a serious case of the itch.