Issue Or Non-Issue? One Of Hillary’s Big Benefactors Is Ukrainian With Trade Links with Iran

The Ukrainian oligarch Victor Pinchuk, 54, has courted the Clintons for at least nine years – in the United States, the Alps and Ukraine, states Newsweek.

Earlier this year, he was confirmed as the largest individual contributor to the Clinton Foundation, whose aims include the creation of “economic opportunity and growth.”

Pinchuck also has connections to the Tony Blair Foundation and was its biggest single donor in 2013.

He is the fourth richest man in Ukraine and owns Interpipe Group, a Cyprus-incorporated manufacturer of seamless pipes used in oil and gas sectors.

Newsweek has seen declarations and documents from Ukraine that show a series of shipments from Interpipe to Iran in 2011 and 2012, including railway parts and products commonly used in the oil and gas sectors.

Among a number of invoices for products related to rail or oil and gas, one shipment for $1.8m (1.7m) in May 2012 was for “seamless hot-worked steel pipes for pipelines” and destined for a city near the Caspian Sea.

Clinton’s political enemies are likely to seize on news that Pinchuck is a major benefactor to the Clinton Foundation and has been trading with Iran and may be in breach of U.S. sanctions imposed on the country, according to Newsweek.

Newsweek states that U.S. sanctions laws are complex and, in certain areas, ill-defined.  Interpipe may qualify for penalties due to the mere presence on American soil of North American Interpipe Inc, its United States subsidiary.

The US authorities can also penalize non-American subsidiaries with no base in the US at all which it judges to be working counter to its foreign policy, as happened to Zhuhai Zhenrong, a Chinese oil company, in 2012.

So be sure to watch for the new “scandal” on FOX !

Republican Governors Want Tax Cuts For Rich, Increases For Goods And Services

TYT Network

A number of Republican-led states are considering tax changes that in many cases would have the effect of cutting taxes on the rich and raising them on the poor, according to the New York Times.

The Washington Monthly’s Steve Benen discusses plans in several Republican gubernatorial mansions to raise taxes… on the poor! Benen:

“Republicans are not, strictly speaking, a party obsessed with cutting taxes. The caricature is rooted in fact, but it’s incomplete – Republicans are actually a party committed to cutting taxes on the wealthy.

“This has been an underappreciated aspect of the GOP vision for several years. Indeed, it was part of Mitt Romney’s ’47 percent’ problem a few years ago – the Republican presidential hopeful complained, among other things, about the millions of families who ‘pay no income tax.’ A wide variety of GOP officeholders, candidates, and pundits have made related complaints about the poor not having “skin in the game” because their tax burdens simply aren’t significant enough.”

Of the 10 or so Republican governors who have proposed tax increases, nearly all have called for increases in consumption taxes, which hit the poor and middle class harder than the rich, according to the New York Times.

Favorite targets for the new taxes include gas, e-cigarettes, and goods and services in general. Gov. Paul R. LePage of Maine wants to start taxing movie tickets and haircuts, but is also proposing a tax break for the lowest-income families to relieve some of the pressure.

Why Is Tanzania Evicting 40,000 People From Their Homes?

Tanzania plans on evicting 40,000 Maasai from their ancestral land that borders Kenya and sell the land for hunting purposes to a wealthy customer.

Last year, though, the Tanzanian government announced it wouldn’t give the 1,500 sq km wildlife corridor next to the Serengeti Park to these interests.

Now it is going back on the deal.  The Maasai have been told to leave their traditional lands by the end of next year.  They will be paid only a token fee for the inconvenience.

Kyle Kulinski discusses it.

Secular Talk video.

More:

http://www.ryot.org/tanzania-is-evicting-the-maasai-from-sacred-land/871321

Is Vladimir Putin Worth 70 Billion Dollars?

Several sources are claiming that Vladimir Putin in worth 70 billion dollars.

Business Insider:

“The analyst, Stanislav Belkovsky, says the Russian president could be worth up to $70 billion.”

From the website TheRichest:

“Current President of Russia Vladimir Putin has an estimated net worth of $70 billion. He has been serving the post since May 7, 2012. Since 2008, he has been serving as the Chairman of political party, United Russia.

“Under his administration as the country’s president, Putin passed into law new legal and land codes, reduced tax profits, and implemented a flat 13% income tax. He is also known to support the defence and nuclear industries.”

According to the Bureau of Investigative Journalism:

“Stanislav Belkovsky, a political analyst and critic of Putin, is one of the most outspoken. He claims Putin could be worth as much as $70 billion, a figure that would make him the richest man in the world.

“This extraordinary sum is based on claims that Putin owns shares in three major oil and gas companies: 4.5% of national gas giant Gazprom, 37% of oil supplier Surgutneftegas and a major shareholder of a company that cannot be named for legal reasons.  That company strenuously denies any links to Putin.

“The figure of $40bn emerged in 2007. That figure could now have changed, I believe at the level of $60-70bn,’ Belkovsky says.

“His estimate is based on information gained from confidential sources around the corporations, Belkovsky claims. But he is reluctant to reveal more.

“All three companies have opaque ownership structures, and it is impossible to identify the shareholdings claimed by Belkovsky.

“Gas and oil producer Surgutneftegas is secretive – an attitude that has not always played in its favour. In 2009 the company bought a 21.2% stake in Hungarian company MOL. However, when Surgutneftegas came to register as a voting shareholder, it was refused. MOL said the company’s lack of transparency around its ownership structure did not comply with Hungarian law.

“Gazprom is the biggest gas extractor in the world; the Russian government controls it with a 50.002% stake. But while Gazprom is more transparent over share ownership, Belkovsky claims Putin’s share is hidden through ‘a non-transparent scheme of successive ownership of off-shore companies and funds.”

According to Celebrity NetWorth:

“Last April, Putin revealed both his salary and estimated net worth. Unfortunately something just didn’t add up. Putin’s disclosure portrayed the controversial leader as a humble man of the people with very meager, practically non-existent, income and assets. This portrayal did not sit well with many experts of Russian government and politics. These experts agree that, without question, Putin has used his last decade of absolute power and wholehearted corruption to stash away a vast personal fortune estimated at more than $70 billion.”

“After Yeltsin unexpectedly resigned on December 31st, 1999, Putin became the acting President of the Russian Federation and thereby launched a nearly 15 year reign of absolute power and control. During his reign, many Russian insiders and experts believe that Putin has used his power to do a little more than improve life for the common Russian citizen. While many previously state-owned industries were privatized, Putin allegedly has used his power to build large secret ownership stakes several multi-billion dollar commodity firms. His most vocal critics assert that Putin has leveraged his power to acquire a 4.5% ownership stake in natural gas producer Gazprom, a 37% stake in oil company Surgutneftegas and 50% stake in Swiss oil-trader Gunvor. Gazprom alone does over $150 billion in revenue annually, Guvnor does $80 billion and Surgutneftegas over $20 billion. Using their most recent market capitalizations, Putin’s combined ownership stakes would give him a personal net worth of $70 billion!”

A LiveLeak report was based on the Celebrity NetWorth information:

“If Vladimir Putin’s net worth truly sits at $70 billion, that would be enough to make him the third richest person on the planet right behind Bill Gates and Carlos Slim Helu. It would likely also represent one of the largest personal fortunes ever accumulated by a sitting President. The only other world leader who possibly looted more cash from his country was Muammar Gaddafi, who after 40 years of power stashed away a reported $200 billion in ill-gotten oil money.”

http://www.thebureauinvestigates.com/2012/04/19/putin-the-richest-man-on-earth/

http://www.businessinsider.com/is-vladmir-putin-secretly-the-richest-person-in-the-world-2012-4

http://www.liveleak.com/view?i=2da_1407764424

http://www.celebritynetworth.com/articles/celebrity/how-vladimir-putin-stashed-away-a-secret-70-billion-personal-fortune/

http://www.therichest.com/celebnetworth/politician/president/vladimir-putin-net-worth/