<div style="text-align: justify; "><b style="font-size: 1rem;">Wrapping up an 18-month probe into last year's deadly attack on the US Capitol, lawmakers will convene Monday to vote on whether to recommend criminal charges against former president Donald Trump and some of his closest aides.</b><br></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br></div><div style="text-align: justify; ">The select House of Representatives committee has interviewed more than 1,000 witnesses and held explosive public hearings into what happened on January 6, 2021 -- and who was responsible for it.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br></div><div style="text-align: justify;">The panel, made up of seven Democrats and two Republicans, will meet at 1:00 pm (1800 GMT) to unveil the findings on their investigation into the deadly riot, in which Trump supporters -- who falsely claimed that the 2020 election was stolen from him by Joe Biden -- ransacked the Capitol.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br></div><div style="text-align: justify;">At least five people died in connection with the melee and 140 police officers were injured. About 900 people have been arrested in connection with the violent rampage, which sent shockwaves across the country and around the world.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br></div><div style="text-align: justify;">The panel will decide whether or not to recommend that the Justice Department seek charges against Trump -- who is running to retake the Oval Office in the 2024 election -- on at least three counts, according to reports.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br></div><div style="text-align: justify;">Those charges would be inciting an insurrection, obstruction of an official proceeding and conspiracy to defraud the US government, NBC News reported Sunday.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br></div><div style="text-align: justify;">Lawmakers cannot authorize charges themselves but can make recommendations to the Justice Department, which has already appointed a special counsel to look into Trump's role in the Capitol riot and his efforts to overturn the 2020 election.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br></div><div style="text-align: justify;">Their vote is nonbinding and largely symbolic -- the decision on charges for Trump will ultimately rest with Attorney General Merrick Garland.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br></div><div style="text-align: justify;">But the three charges reportedly being considered could result in prison time and a ban from public office for the former president, who still wields considerable power in the Republican Party.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br></div><div style="text-align: justify;">"I think that the evidence is there that Donald Trump committed criminal offenses in connection with his efforts to overturn the election," Democratic committee member Adam Schiff, a former federal prosecutor, told CNN on Sunday.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br></div><div style="text-align: justify;">The committee may also make legislative recommendations to protect the process of certifying election results.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br></div><div style="text-align: justify;">Its final report is due for release on Wednesday.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br></div><div style="text-align: justify;">- 'Democrats, misfits and thugs' -</div><div style="text-align: justify;">Schiff did not offer details on possible criminal referrals against Trump, or even say how he himself would vote.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br></div><div style="text-align: justify;">But on CNN's "State of the Union" news program, he did say: "I think the president has violated multiple criminal laws. And I think you have to be treated like any other American who breaks the law, and that is, you have to be prosecuted."</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br></div><div style="text-align: justify;">Trump has repeatedly disparaged the House panel on his own Truth Social platform, calling the members "Democrats, misfits and thugs."</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br></div><div style="text-align: justify;">He has defended the speech he gave before the January 6 riot and his other actions that day as "mild &amp; loving."</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br></div><div style="text-align: justify;">On that day, he called on his supporters to "fight like hell."</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br></div><div style="text-align: justify;">- 'Attempted coup' -</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br></div><div style="text-align: justify;">Since July 2021, the House select committee has sought to shed light on the former president's actions before and during January 6, 2021.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br></div><div style="text-align: justify;">Across eight hearings this past summer, the panel unveiled reams of evidence on Trump's involvement in a labyrinthine series of connected schemes to overturn the election -- and the impossibility of the Republican not knowing he had lost to Biden.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br></div><div style="text-align: justify;">Trump was "at the center" of "an attempted coup," the head of the committee, Representative Bennie Thompson, has said.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br></div><div style="text-align: justify;">The panel interviewed several Trump aides including his then Attorney General Bill Barr and even his daughter Ivanka. In snippets of interviews shown to the public, many of them said they never believed there had been election fraud.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br></div><div style="text-align: justify;">The committee also revealed the pressure Trump had placed on his own vice president Mike Pence and other officials, notably in the key states of Georgia and Arizona, in a campaign of intimidation aimed at invalidating the November 2020 election. AFP</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br></div><div style="text-align: justify; ">bnbd24/kh</div>