Epstein mentioned faith with Tony Blair at quantity 10 in assembly arrange by Mandelson
Peter Mandelson set up a meeting between Jeffrey Epstein and then-prime minister Tony Blair by name-dropping the US president Bill Clinton, documents released this week have shown
Tony Blair with Peter Mandelson(Image: PA Wire)
Tony Blair discussed religion with Jeffrey Epstein during a Downing Street meeting set up by Peter Mandelson, documents show. The paedo financier claimed the ex-PM told him he wanted “understand the nature that religion plays in world conflicts.”
During the 2002 meeting, Blair is said to have told Epstein he “consulted a wise religious man for personal advice”. Details of the meeting emerged in a note Epstein emailed to himself in December 2018, just months before his arrest.
The email, found in a trove of more than three million documents released by the US department of justice, reads: “I met Tony at number 10. He told me then that his future goal was to understand the nature that religion plays in world conflicts.
“He told me that he had a wise religioius [sic] man in Austrailia [sic] that he would consult when he needed personal advice. btw I am very happy to be called your friend.”
The “religious man” is thought to be Peter Thomson, an Australian Anglican priest Blair met while studying at Oxford. The former PM once described Thomson as a “spellbinding” figure who had awakened his interest in religion.
Separate files released to Parliament this week show that Mandelson had pushed for Blair to meet his “young and vibrant” friend Epstein before the meeting took place.
Mandelson – who was sacked at US ambassador and faces a criminal probe over his links to Epstein – said in the email that Bill Clinton had told Blair he wanted to introduce his “travelling friend” Epstein.
Mandelson described Epstein as an “active scientific catalyst/entrepreneur” who had his “finger on the pulse of many world markets and currencies”.
He wrote: “He’s young and vibrant. He’s safe (whatever that means) and Clinton is now doing a lot of travelling with him.”
The meeting with Blair was six years before Epstein pleaded guilty to soliciting prostitution from a minor in June 2008. Epstein died in 2019 while awaiting trial on sex trafficking charges, eight months after the date of the email.
A spokesman for Blair said: “As far as he can remember, Mr Blair met with him for less than 30 minutes in Downing Street in May 2002 and discussed US and UK politics.
“He never met or engaged with him subsequently. This was, of course, long before his crimes were known of and his subsequent conviction.”
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