WSJ Chief Foreign Affairs Correspondent was involved in arms and surveillance deals to Middle East while reporting on the Middle East.
Wall Street Journal fires correspondent over ethics conflict
Wall Street Journal fires correspondent over ethics conflict
- Jay Solomon was chief foreign affairs correspondent for the Wall Street Journal.
- Farhad Azima is an Iranian-American aviation tycoon who who is known to have transported weapons for the CIA.
- Azima, along with 2 ex-CIA employees, starts Denx LLC, an surveillance and intelligence company.
- Solomon begins a relationship with Azima after using him as a source for Iran-related stories.
- Azima eventually offers Solomon a 10% stake in Denx LLC.
- Solomon claims innocence: ”I never entered into any business with Farhad Azima, nor did I ever intend to".
- The two ex-CIA employees claim that 'Solomon was involved in discussing proposed deals with Azima at the same time he continued to cultivate the businessman as a source for his stories'.
- They also claim Solomon withdrew from the business shortly thereafter but 'provided no evidence as to when Solomon withdrew'.
- AP investigation uncovered 8 years of email and text exchanges that included 'more than 18 months of communications involving the apparent business effort'.
- Some messages described 'a need for Solomon's Social Security number to file the company's taxes'.
- In October 2014, Solomon wrote to Azima in a text message: ”Our business opportunities are so promising".
- In April 2015, Azima wrote to Solomon about a proposal for a $725 million air-operations, surveillance and reconnaissance support contract with the United Arab Emirates that would allow planes to spy on activity inside nearby Iran. Solomon was supposed to ferry the proposal to UAE government representatives at a lunch the following day. ”We all wish best of luck to Jay on his first defense sale," Azima wrote to Solomon, Bernsten and Modell.
- In August 2016, Solomon releases his book 'The Iran Wars' in which he argues 'that the United States and its global partners gave away too much and got taken for a ride by forging an agreement to prevent Iran from expanding its nuclear program. Even more ominous, he declares, the agreement makes the world more, not less, dangerous' and claims that ”this Iran deal, rather than calming the world's most combustible region, risks enflaming it".
