Now Blair strikes deal to advise an oil-rich despot: Ex-PM sends team to Kazakhstan to help his friend the president
By James ChapmaN, ANDREW PIERCE and Daniel Martin
Last updated at 10:45 PM on 21st October 2011
Tony Blair has assembled a high-powered team to advise the controversial oil and gas-rich central Asian state of Kazakhstan after befriending its president during his time in Downing Street.
The former Prime Minister has brokered a deal with the country’s government to provide advice on improving its chequered international reputation and forging business links across Europe.
According to one source, the deal is worth as much as $13million (£8.2million) for the companies involved, though last night Mr Blair flatly denied making any ‘personal profit’, saying the figure quoted was incorrect.
U.S. diplomatic cables have accused Kazakhstan of ‘pervasive corruption’ and deploying ‘torture’ techniques.
The former Prime Minister now runs an advisory firm called Tony Blair Associates, and has a wide range of clients which has included investment bank JP Morgan Chase, insurance giant Zurich and the government of Kuwait. None of these three are involved in the Kazakh deal.
Mr Blair met Kazakh president Nursultan Nazarbayev when he visited Downing Street in 2006 and has gone to great lengths to cultivate the relationship since leaving office.
The country has been desperate to improve its international image after being mocked as an underdeveloped nation of sexists and racists by British comedian Sacha Baron Cohen in the hit 2006 film Borat.
More seriously, the U.S. cables note: ‘Severe limits on ability to change their government; detainee and prisoner torture and other abuse; unhealthy prisoner conditions; arbitrary arrest and detention; lack of an independent judiciary; restrictions on freedom of speech; pervasive corruption, especially in law enforcement and the judicial system; discrimination and violence against women; trafficking in persons.’
However, a string of New Labour figures close to Mr Blair have visited the country to forge links. The former Prime Minister himself travelled to Kazakhstan in January this year to meet President Nazarbayev.
At the January 31 meeting, he is understood to have discussed the establishment of new financial institutions to attract investment. Many of the investors could be wealthy clients of his investment advisory company, Firerush Ventures No. 3.
Just ten days later, former Downing Street chief of staff Jonathan Powell flew to Kazakhstan leading a high-powered team. Mr Powell had helped Mr Blair set up his investment firm and works for the company. The visit was apparently to do with human rights.
Craig Murray, former British ambassador to neighbouring Uzbekistan, said earlier this year: ‘All Tony Blair is really doing, whether he knows it or not, is lending respectability to an oligarch with a shocking reputation on human rights.’
Mr Blair is also known to have visited Kazakhstan in 2008, when he told state-owned Kazakh TV: ‘I am very glad to visit Astana [the capital] and Kazakhstan. Your capital is a very unique city. It demonstrates the power and development level of Kazakhstan.’ And in 2003, Mr Blair sent his chief fundraiser Lord Levy to scope out Kazakhstan in a bid to help UK firms win contracts.
Alastair Campbell, meanwhile, visited Kazakhstan earlier this month, and was spotted on a plane back from Astana. The former spin doctor would not say whether his visit was connected to Mr Blair. Although he said he was doing some consultancy work, he said it was ‘nothing like on the scale that Tony is doing’.
A spokesman for Mr Blair last night did not respond to questions about whether Mr Powell and Mr Campbell were part of the team advising the Kazakhs.
However, Portland, a communications company with close links to New Labour, is understood to be involved.
Mr Blair’s spokesman confirmed: ‘Tony Blair has helped put together a team of international advisors and consultants to set up an advisory group for the Kazakhs, with a team of people working on the ground. The work they are doing is excellent, sensible and supports the reforms they are making. The Kazakhs also engage with a number of other former European leaders.
‘Tony Blair last visited Kazakhstan in May of this year to attend a conference. He has taken no personal profit and is not doing business in Kazakhstan.
‘To be clear, Tony Blair is not personally making a profit directly or indirectly through Tony Blair Associates or any other company on this. The $13million figure is wrong.’
A spokesman for Portland declined to comment.
Mr Blair is believed to have made at least £20million since he left Downing Street in June 2007.
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