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Amar among big donors to Clinton trust

The Samajwadi Party general secretary’s name has popped up on a list of big-ticket donors to the Bill Clinton Foundation.

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NEW YORK: What do Amar Singh and Bill Clinton have in common? Not much until a day ago, when the Samajwadi Party general secretary’s name popped up on a list of big-ticket donors to the Bill Clinton Foundation.

The former president on Thursday reluctantly laid bare the list after a decade of secrecy. President-elect Barack Obama made senator Hillary Clinton’s nomination as secretary of state dependent on her husband revealing the foundation’s contributors, to avoid questions about conflicts of interest.

Other donors include Suzlon Energy headed by Tulsi R Tanti, steel magnate Lakshmi Mittal, and the Confederation of Indian Industry.There are also oil-rich West Asian governments and millionaires from India, Canada, Nigeria, Britain, and the Ukraine.
But the list has set tongues wagging as it offers a glimpse into the big-dollar world in which Bill Clinton has travelled since leaving the White House.

The non-profit William J Clinton Foundation posted the names of 205,000 donors on http:www.clintonfoundation.orgcontributors, ending years of resistance to identifying the sources of its money.

The US media made much about some donors having ties to Indian interests that could prove troubling to Pakistan. The New York Times said the “potential for appearances of conflict was illustrated by Amar Singh, a politician in India who gave $1 million to $5 million.” It said Singh, who played host to Bill Clinton on a visit to India in 2005, met Hillary Clinton in New York in September to lobby for the India-US civil nuclear agreement.

“He met Mrs Clinton, who he said assured him that Democrats would not block the deal. Congress approved it weeks later,” said the paper. The deal is a sore point with Pakistan.

The Associated Press also observed that the donor list “underscores ties between the Clintons and India, a connection that could complicate diplomatic perceptions of whether Hillary Clinton can be a neutral broker between India and neighbour Pakistan” where Obama will face an early test of his foreign policy leadership.

Also in the $1million to $5 million donor category were Suzlon Energy and Mittal. The CII and Dave Prasad Katragadda, an Indian capital manager who leads the Seven Hills Group, each gave between $500,000 and $1 million.

Saudi Arabia alone gave to the foundation $10 million to $25 million, as did government aid agencies in Australia and the Dominican Republic. Brunei, Kuwait, Norway, Oman, Qatar, and Taiwan each gave more than $1 million to Bill Clinton’s charitable efforts to reduce poverty and treat Aids.

“Past donations to the Clinton foundation have no connection to senator Clinton’s prospective tenure as secretary of state,” said Stephanie Cutter, a spokeswoman for Obama.

Republicans have said they will examine the issue but not necessarily hold up Clinton’s confirmation. Senator Richard Lugar, the top Republican on the foreign relations committee, has said he will support her. The foreign relations committee will hold hearings and vote on Clinton’s nomination before sending it to the full Senate.
Bill Clinton’s foundation has raised $500 million since 1997, growing into a global operation with 1,100 employees in 40 countries.

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