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More than a decade ago, before running for president, Donald Trump expressed interest in doing the same in Belgrade, for which his son-in-law now plans to invest $500 million in reconstruction.
By Eric Lipton, Maggie Haberman and Jonathan Swan
The plan by Jared Kushner and his business partners to rebuild a popular site in the Serbian capital, Belgrade, echoes Donald Trump’s interest a decade ago in a deal on the site, and a similar proposal boosted his stay in the White House. through a senior executive. An assistant who now works with Mr. Kushner, a review of the assignment shows.
The tentative agreement between Kushner’s team and the Serbian government would give Kushner’s investment firm a 99-year no-fee lease and the right to build a luxury hotel and apartment complex, as well as a museum on the site of the former headquarters. of the Yugoslav Ministry of Defense in Belgrade, which bombed through NATO in 1999. A draft agreement provided to the New York Times through a Serbian official
In 2013, two years before he was to run for president, Trump (Kushner’s father) told a senior Serbian government official that he was looking to build a luxury hotel on the site. Associates of the Trump Organization traveled to Belgrade to inspect the site. The assignment did not materialize before Trump’s election in 2016, and after being sworn in, he pledged not to participate in any new agreements with foreign countries.
But going back up would pique the interest of M’s entourage. Trump.
Richard Grenell, whom Trump appointed special envoy to the Balkans, championed a similar plan under Trump’s direction under which Serbia and the United States would work together to rebuild the Defense Department site. He advocated employing U. S. investments in the Belgrade site while still on his official duties as a U. S. diplomat in 2020, according to transcripts and a recording of remarks made at various government news conferences.
Kushner said in an interview Sunday that he had never discussed the Belgrade plan with Kushner Trump and was unaware of his father-in-law’s past interest in rebuilding the site.
“I didn’t know my father-in-law was interested in this area and I doubt he knew the deal we’re making,” Kushner said.
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