UPDATE 8AM ET May 12 – Secretary Kerry arrived in Sochi this morning, with a meeting with President Putin now confirmed. As well as the situation in Ukraine, the two are set to discuss Iran, Yemen and the campaign against ISIS. 

 

US Secretary of State John Kerry will meet his Russian counterpart Sergei Lavrov on Tuesday in Sochi – the first cabinet-level visit to Russia since the start of the crisis in Ukraine. It was still unconfirmed late on Monday whether Kerry would also meet with President Vladimir Putin, although the Wall Street Journal reported that

The Kremlin didn’t immediately confirm the meeting with Mr. Putin, though a spokesman had said last week one was possible. State Department spokeswoman Marie Harf said: “It’s certainly our understanding that it’s confirmed.”

Meanwhile the White House continues to play down the absence of Saudi Arabia’s King Salman from President Obama’s gulf leaders summit later this week.

The Saudi foreign minister said the King’s decision to skip Thursday’s gathering was not a “snub” but Jennifer Rubin at the Washington Post writes:

To say this is a slight or an insult is to minimize the symbolism of the decision. The Saudi king is telling America and the world: There is nothing President Obama can promise that is worth the trip.

 ***

* WORLD * Fallout continues from Seymour Hersh’s article on the official account surrounding the raid that killed Osama Bin Laden – which, incidentally, temporarily crashed the London Review of Books site. Max Fisher at Vox looks at the “many problems” with Hersh’s “conspiracy theory”.

If [Hersh’s account] seems like worryingly little evidence for a story that accuses hundreds of people across three governments of staging a massive international hoax that has gone on for years, then you are not alone.

On Sunday night, national security journalists and analysts on Twitter picked through the story, expressing dismay at its tissue-thin sourcing, its leaps of logic, and its internal contradictions.

Politico said US officials were left “fuming” by the story, while a former CIA official told Business Insider Hersh’s account was “not plausible.” NBC News, however, appeared to confirm elements of the story.

Separately, a former CIA agent convicted of sharing classified information with a New York Times reporter was sentenced to three and a half years in prison.

***

* POLITICS * The Senate will vote on Tuesday on whether to grant President Obama trade promotion authority – an issue that has sharply divided congressional Democrats.

Chris Christie apparently spent $82,000 of taxpayer money on food and drinks at NFL games. Philip Bump at the Washington Post looks at some other things he could have spent the money – more than $1,400 on 58 separate occasions at New York Jets and Giants games – on including

Three years of tuition at Rutgers. The amount Christie spent at football games is almost exactly enough to cover freshman through junior years at Rutgers.

Are the Governor’s presidential ambitions finally finished this time? Olivia Nuzzi at The Daily Beast writes that “.. history suggests that Christie is a political cockroach, or a zombie, or a tomb-escaping, well-fed Jesus. But can he come back from the dead again?”

http://twitter.com/russbengtson/status/597774523300237314

Christie’s fellow GOP Presidential hopeful Mike Huckabee told CBS “I don’t have to defend everything I’ve ever done,” but then kind of did exactly that. Meanwhile, Bloomberg‘s Mark Halperin apologized for questions he asked Sen Ted Cruz during an interview the Washington Post described as “cringey.”

***

* BRITISH POLITICS * As Ed Miliband headed for a post-election holiday in Ibiza, his brother David gave an exclusive interview to the BBC, in which he said that voters “did not want what was being offered” under his brother’s leadership of the Labour party.

(BBC)

UKIP’s Nigel Farage might not be stepping down as leader after all, withdrawing his resignation after the party said it had “refused to accept it.”

***

* CULTURE * Pablo Picasso’s 1955 painting “Les femmes d’Alger (Version “O”),” became the most expensive work of art ever sold at auction, when it was bought for $180million at Christie’s in New York, some $40million above estimates.

American Idol will end its run next year, after being cancelled by Fox. Simon Cowell said “We had a blast.”

***

* MEDIA * After the New York Times‘ remarkable investigative piece on nail salons and the “underpaid and underprotected” people who work in them – which the Columbia Journalism Review reports is being translated into four languages – New York Governor Andrew Cuomo announced emergency actions to improve working conditions. NPR reports:

“We will not stand idly by as workers are deprived of their hard-earned wages and robbed of their most basic rights,” said Cuomo in a statement. “This task force will crack down on these kinds of abuses in the nail salon industry, enforce all of New York’s health and safety regulations, and help ensure that no one, regardless of their citizenship status or what language they speak, is illegally victimized by their employer.”

There is anxiety in some quarters over the future of the BBC, amid a sense that the incoming Conservative government is “at war” with the Corporation by appointing license fee critic John Whittingdale as Culture Secretary. The Independent reports:

Mr Whittingdale is expected to make changes in the way the BBC is funded and governed. He has described the flat-rate, £145.50-a-year licence fee as “worse than the poll tax” and suggested it could become “unsustainable” in the long term. He said last autumn: “I think there’s quite an attractive option of linking it to a specific household tax – maybe council tax.”

Bellingcat, the investigative site that has pioneered the use of geolocating images to contextualize and amplify news stories, says it has a “big announcement” on Ukraine set for Tuesday.

http://twitter.com/EliotHiggins/status/597766781437124610

***

* SPORTS * The NFL suspended Patriots QB Tom Brady for four games, and imposed additional sanctions on the team – including a $1million fine – for their alleged roles in the whole “deflategate” nonsense. Brady’s agent says he will appeal.