Rudy Giuliani met with Ukrainian conspiracy theorist last week -- as impeachment moves forward

Rudy Giuliani is continuing his back-channel diplomacy with Ukrainian officials, even as the U.S. House investigates those efforts in an impeachment inquiry.

President Donald Trump's personal lawyer met privately just last week at his Manhattan office with former Ukrainian diplomat Andriy Telizhenko, who is pushing a conspiracy theory involving the 2016 election, reported NBC News.

Telizhenko claims his country's government conspired with the Democratic National Committee to damage Trump's election chances against Hillary Clinton, which contradicts findings by U.S. intelligence and law enforcement agencies.

"We discussed what's happening in Ukraine," Telizhenko confirmed to NBC News, "political updates, what the new (Ukrainian presidential) team is up to, what are the reforms going to be."

Giuliani has interviewed him for hours regarding his Ukraine claims, but Telizhenko said they did not discuss those investigations at their most recent meeting.

"We're friends now," Telizhenko said. "He respects our country."

As U.S. lawmakers investigate Trump and his associates' actions toward Ukraine, some parliamentarians in that country are pushing for a new commission to investigate claims that their country worked to smear Trump's currently imprisoned campaign chairman Paul Manafort, along with an investigation of Joe Biden and his son.

"Ukraine was involved in like the biggest scandal in recent U.S. political history, let alone Ukrainian. Definitely most of my colleagues here pretend it doesn't exist," claims Oleg Voloshin, a parliament member and Manafort associate. "It started here, and it should finish here."

While that investigative commission is unlikely to be approved, the parliamentary push to establish one may be enough for Trump to claim Ukraine was looking into 2016 election meddling and the Bidens.

"Dems covering up because it's bigger than you think," Giuliani tweeted last week, although he declined comment on the NBC News report involving Telizhenko.