Clinton Cash Read Online Free PDF Page A

the New Yorker in a rare moment of candor, “All of my chips, almost, are on Bill Clinton. He’s a brand, a worldwide brand, and he can do things and ask for things that no one else can.” 11
    According to Clinton and Giustra, they first met in 2005. 12 Technically, that might be correct. But their business ties actually go back decades earlier.
    Both men were involved with mining entrepreneur Jean-Raymond Boulle, whose company Diamond Fields invested in an Arkansas diamond mine that Clinton approved when he was governor. 13 At the time, Diamond Fields had its eye on an Arkansas state park known to have diamond deposits. So Boulle went to Little Rock and hooked up with Clinton pal Jim Blair. 14 (Blair made headlines in 1994 as the man who helped Hillary Clinton turn $1,000 into $100,000 in futures.) Blair took Boulle to see Governor Clinton and pitched a diamond mine in the Crater of Diamonds State Park. 15 Boulle claimed the mine could become “one of the world’s largest diamond producers.” 16 Governor Clinton signed off on the project and helped get the property green-lighted for mining in 1987. Clinton pal Bruce Lindsey (who went on to become a senior White House adviser and nowserves as chairman of the board of the Clinton Foundation) provided legal services to the fledgling company. For good measure, Diamond Fields set up its corporate headquarters in Hope, Bill Clinton’s hometown. 17
    When Bill was elected president, Boulle was an invited guest at the inauguration in Washington, DC. That night, as the Clintons celebrated their victory at several inaugural balls around town, Hillary wore a 3.5-carat diamond ring that came from one of Boulle’s mines.
    Giustra, through a variety of domestic and offshore holding companies, had more than sixty thousand shares of stock in Diamond Fields in the early 1990s. 18 But by 2005 the public face of the Clinton-Giustra relationship was all about philanthropy. The two would establish something called the Clinton Giustra Sustainable Growth Initiative (CGSGI) as a project of the Clinton Foundation. CGSGI is supposed to foster economic growth in the developing world. Its activities are often sited near “natural resource industry” projects such as mines or oilfields in which Giustra is invested.
    A ccess to Kazakh mining concessions is highly competitive. Large mining companies from Australia to Russia vie for them. Giustra’s company, UrAsia Energy, was a new player with no background in the uranium business and was therefore far from the logical choice for Kazatomprom, the Kazakh atomic energy agency. Other companies with decades of experience in the field should have been first in line for this lucrative deal. “Everyone was asking Kazatomprom to the dance,” said Fadi Shadid, a senior uranium industry stock analyst. “A second-tier junior player like UrAsia—you’d need all the help you could get.” 19 UrAsia Energy was a mere shell company. But with Nazarbayev’s approval, that was about to change.
    Giustra had his eye on three mines several hundred miles from Almaty. The deal was obscure from the start: the mining concessions were transferred to mysterious offshore entities including Jeffcott Group Ltd., which was registered in the British Virgin Islands. Giustra and others involved in the venture later claimed they didn’t even know who actually owned the mysterious entity. “We dealt with corporations and entities that had title to the assets,” said Chris Sattler, executive vice president of corporate development and investor relations of Uranium One (of which UrAsia Energy would soon become part). “In fact, we dealt with their representatives. . . . Therefore, we have no knowledge of the beneficiaries or shareholders behind Jeffcott.” 20 On other occasions, Frank Giustra claims to have known precisely whom he was dealing with in the transaction.
    Clinton’s itinerary included a lavish private feast with the Kazakh dictator, as well as a public press