This could be a bigger deal that what originally appears on the surface. It’s one of those things that make other things make sense.

For several years people have wondered what would be the specific benefit to foreign entities sending millions of dollars to the Clinton Family Foundation while Hillary was Secretary of State.

Obviously most of the outside interest is directed toward inquiry and concern of a quid-pro-quo relationship between the State Dept and the donor itself.
However, HotAir shares a specific example that might actually make more sense when considering the contributions on a larger context.
The U.S. State Dept is responsible for oversight of sanctions imposed against nation states like Iran and Cuba. If an entity, individual or nation state, wanted to engage in a business deal in direct violation of those sanctions, and do business with Iran or Cuba, a direct donation to the head of the body who would be in charge of the oversight might help your efforts.
(Via Hot Air) Is another shoe about to drop on the Clinton Foundation, and on Hillary Clinton’s problematic rollout? Newsweek’s Rory Ross reported this morning that the largest individual donor to the Clinton family business has conducted trade with Iran, perhaps in breach of US sanctions. Ukrainian energy mogul Victor Pinchuk has connections to the Clintons that go back almost a decade, and financial connections to the regime in Tehran that go much farther:
The fourth richest man in Ukraine, Pinchuk 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 high-value 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.
Both the rail and oil and gas sectors are sanctioned by the US, which specifically prohibits any single invoice to the Iranian petrochemical industry worth more than $1m.
In other words, Interpipe should have been slapped with penalties and sanctions for its operations with Iran. Pinchuk’s company has a US subsidiary, which means that US sanctions apply across the entire organization. The agency for imposing penalties for sanctions violations in these cases, Ross notes, is the State Department. Who was in charge at the State Department during this period? None other than Hillary Clinton.
Pinchuk was among an elite few dumping tons of money into the Clinton Foundation, some of whom have interesting connections for a former Secretary of State (read more).