In a Telegraph piece on Friday, Peter Oborne, the paper’s chief political commentator, shed light on some particularly tangled webs Blair has been weaving as a MidEast peace envoy for the Quartet—the U.S., Russia, the European Union, and the United Nations. According to the Telegraph, under the auspices of the Quartet, Blair has conducted a series of trips to visit Middle Eastern leaders, including former Libyan dictator Muammar Ghaddafi and the emir of Kuwait, wherein he allegedly played the diplomat “in the morning,” then turned around and lobbied the same leaders for business deals for his commercial consultancy, Tony Blair Associates, or for J.P. Morgan, a U.S. bank that employs him as an adviser, reportedly to the tune of 2 million pounds a year. Both Blair and J.P. Morgan have issued denials that any conflict of interest exists or that Blair had expressly lobbied Mideast leaders on the bank’s behalf. The documentary accuses Blair of caring more about enriching himself than about peace in the MidEast and Palestine. Prime Minister Tony Blair, left, embraces Colonel Muammar Gaddafi after a meeting on May 29, 2007 in Sirte, Libya. , Peter Macdiarmid / Getty Images The paper noted that Blair has been living a “jet-setting billionaire lifestyle” and slammed his behavior as “an extraordinary confusion of public duty and private interest.” It’s a charge that has been leveled against other former world leaders who have raked in big bucks since leaving office, including former U.S. President Bill Clinton, who has been criticized by conservatives for earning millions in speaking engagements from foreign companies while his wife served in the U.S. Senate. The piece preempted a flurry of negative headlines over the weekend, mostly from the Telegraph itself—“Tony Blair’s Byzantine World of Advisers and Lucrative Deals,” “Tony Blair’s Six Secret Visits to Col. Gaddafi,” “Tony Blair Linked To Libyan Deal With Russian Oligarch”—all leading up to the Oborne-authored program on Channel 4 tonight. Some noteworthy items from the Channel 4 report: Blair is a lot richer than you think The report opens with a look at exactly how rich Tony Blair has become after leaving office, and the dazzling variety of ways he’s made his money. The former prime minister has so far netted a reported 9 million pounds for his public speaking engagements. He gets half a million pounds a year from Swiss insurers Zurich, as well as the aforementioned 2 million pounds yearly from J.P. Morgan, a contract signed a mere seven months after his tenure ended at Downing Street. He’s also paid to promote Louis Vuitton. “It’s impossible to tell exactly how much Tony Blair is being paid,” says Oborne in the segment. Suffice it to say, it’s a staggering amount. Of course, Blair’s no longer a public servant, so making money isn’t a crime. But Oborne goes on to accuse Blair of caring too much about enriching himself, and not enough about his stated mission of peace between Palestine and Israel. Blair’s financial interests are distracting him from his mandate at the Quartet: peace and development in Palestine.Tony Blair’s Shady Millions
A new documentary accuses the former British prime minister of using diplomatic trips as a guise for business deals.
Tuesday, 27 September 2011
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