Brothers of Osama Bin Laden Donate £1 million to Prince Charles
A report of 2013 has resurfaced again, which revealed that Prince Charles Foundation has accepted donations by the family members of Osama Bin Laden.
Everyone knows Osama bin Laden. He was the mastermind behind the deadly 9/11 attacks and is considered as the most dangerous terrorist in the world. He was killed by the USA in 2011. In an extremely shocking incident Prince Charles, the official successor to the British throne after Queen Elizabeth, accepted a 1 million pounds around 9.6 Crore Indian Rupees as a donation for Osama’s family! Isn’t that shocking! A royal prince took money from a terrorists family. This donation was received by the Prince of Wales's Charitable Fund (PWCF) in 2013, which is around 9 years back. It is a UK-registered non-profit organisations to deliver projects in the UK and overseas. Osama belongs to a wealthy family in Saudi Arabia.
Bin Laden was disowned by his family in 1994 as he got involved in terrorist activities. Bakr bin Laden and his brother Shafiq are half-brothers of terrorist leader Osama. They say they have no links to the terrorists.
So in 2013, these two brothers made the donation to PWCF. The Sunday Times newspapers did an investigation on this and spoke to multiple confidential sources who said that Prince Charles accepted the money from Bakr Bin Laden after having a meeting with him.
Prince Charles took the money despite objections from his personal advisers and the PWCF. However, Sir Ian Cheshire, chairman of PWCF, told the newspaper that the donation was agreed "carefully considered" by the five trustees at the time. He said No rule has been broken, no law has been broken. All appropriate checks were carried out and even the Foreign Ministry was called upon to give its opinion - it cleared the donation.
A source at the Prince of Wales's Charitable Fund told the BBC that just because Osama Bin Laden was a terrorist- should not disqualify other members of the family from making a donation. Which makes sense.
But equally, did Prince Charles or his inner circle really think it was a good idea to take money from the Bin Ladens? Or did they think it was fine so long as it was never made public? Because once it was public - however many checks were made and rules were followed - it was always going to look horrible. This is not the first time that Prince Charles or his charity have been scrutinized over its donations. It was reported last month that Prince Charles accepted a suitcase containing a million euros in cash from a former Qatari prime minister - one of three cash donations totalling around £2.5m. In February, the UK Police began an investigation as there were complaints that a Saudi Arabia Man made huge donations to Prince Charles and in return got British Citizenship and medals to a Saudi citizen. What do you think about this 9-year-old story, which has now again resurfaced and brought into the light? Do mention your thoughts in the comment section below.
