Hillary Clinton emails reveal Cherie Blair acted as go-between for leading Qatari and the-then US Secretary of State

Republican opponents handed ammunition likely to be used in the imminent race for the White House

Hillary Clinton and Cherie Blair at the 2012 International Council on Women's Business Leadership (Getty Images)

The “Special Relationship” at the top of US-UK politics may have a new meaning after emails released in Washington DC revealed that Cherie Blair acted as a go-between for a leading Qatari to help secure a meeting with Hillary Clinton.

The wife of the former British prime minister, Tony Blair, lobbied Mrs Clinton, then US Secretary of State, for a “woman-to-woman” meeting in the American capital with Sheikha Mozah bint Nasser al-Missned.

Sheikha Mozah’s son is the current ruling emir of Qatar, Sheikh Tamin bin Hamad al-Thani.

Using the close relationship that her husband and Bill Clinton built up during their respective years in Downing Street and the White House, Mrs Blair exchanged a series of 19 emails in 2009 asking Mrs Clinton to help Sheikha Moser improve Qatar’s relationship with the US.

Although the meeting was aimed primarily on the Qatari royal’s charitable interests, Mrs Blair admitted to the US Secretary of State that “I am sure the conversation would not be confined to these interests [disability charities] but would be about the US/Qatar relationship generally.”

When Mrs Clinton finally agreed to meet with Middle East royal, who Mrs Blair referred to as “My friend from Q”, she replied to the green light, stating: “Great… when I see what a difference you are making it reminds me why politics is too important to be left to bad people.”

Although the correspondence may be embarrassing for Mrs Blair because of its resemblance to a behind-the-scenes role promoting the soft-power of the wealthy Gulf state, more is at stake for Mrs Clinton.

As a front-runner for the Democratic presidential nomination, Qatar’s substantial donations to the foundation set up by her husband means her Republican opponents are being handed ammunition likely to be used in the imminent race for the White House.

Two months ago it emerged that the Qatar 2022 organising committee, which was focused on securing football’s World Cup, had made donations to the Clinton Foundation in 2013 of between $250,000 and $500,000.

The Blair messages are in the latest tranche of Mrs Clinton’s emails which have been released by the State Department following a ruling by a federal judge. Ahead of her appointment to the Obama cabinet, Mrs Clinton decided to use a personal email account connected to a server at her New York home.

Government officials can legally use personal accounts, but usually they run in parallel with federal accounts. Mrs Clinton however decided not to opt in to the government system which prevented her own officials from accessing her correspondence.

In October last year, following the court ruling, Mrs Clinton began sending 55,000 pages of her personal emails to state authorities.

Every month until January next year, the State Department will release new batches of the Clinton emails. The Republicans, likely to take advantage of the drip-feed, are furious that Mrs Clinton has been allowed to decide what constitutes official business. She is understood to have wiped clean the rest of the server’s data.

A spokesperson for Mrs Blair said: “Cherie Blair established a relationship with Sheikha Mozah over a number of years based on their shared interest in disability issues.” The spokesperson said she was “merely acting as a conduit” between the Qatari royal and Mrs Clinton.