Calendar An icon of a desk calendar. Cancel An icon of a circle with a diagonal line across. Caret An icon of a block arrow pointing to the right. Email An icon of a paper envelope. Facebook An icon of the Facebook "f" mark. Google An icon of the Google "G" mark. Linked In An icon of the Linked In "in" mark. Logout An icon representing logout. Profile An icon that resembles human head and shoulders. Telephone An icon of a traditional telephone receiver. Tick An icon of a tick mark. Is Public An icon of a human eye and eyelashes. Is Not Public An icon of a human eye and eyelashes with a diagonal line through it. Pause Icon A two-lined pause icon for stopping interactions. Quote Mark A opening quote mark. Quote Mark A closing quote mark. Arrow An icon of an arrow. Folder An icon of a paper folder. Breaking An icon of an exclamation mark on a circular background. Camera An icon of a digital camera. Caret An icon of a caret arrow. Clock An icon of a clock face. Close An icon of the an X shape. Close Icon An icon used to represent where to interact to collapse or dismiss a component Comment An icon of a speech bubble. Comments An icon of a speech bubble, denoting user comments. Comments An icon of a speech bubble, denoting user comments. Ellipsis An icon of 3 horizontal dots. Envelope An icon of a paper envelope. Facebook An icon of a facebook f logo. Camera An icon of a digital camera. Home An icon of a house. Instagram An icon of the Instagram logo. LinkedIn An icon of the LinkedIn logo. Magnifying Glass An icon of a magnifying glass. Search Icon A magnifying glass icon that is used to represent the function of searching. Menu An icon of 3 horizontal lines. Hamburger Menu Icon An icon used to represent a collapsed menu. Next An icon of an arrow pointing to the right. Notice An explanation mark centred inside a circle. Previous An icon of an arrow pointing to the left. Rating An icon of a star. Tag An icon of a tag. Twitter An icon of the Twitter logo. Video Camera An icon of a video camera shape. Speech Bubble Icon A icon displaying a speech bubble WhatsApp An icon of the WhatsApp logo. Information An icon of an information logo. Plus A mathematical 'plus' symbol. Duration An icon indicating Time. Success Tick An icon of a green tick. Success Tick Timeout An icon of a greyed out success tick. Loading Spinner An icon of a loading spinner. Facebook Messenger An icon of the facebook messenger app logo. Facebook An icon of a facebook f logo. Facebook Messenger An icon of the Twitter app logo. LinkedIn An icon of the LinkedIn logo. WhatsApp Messenger An icon of the Whatsapp messenger app logo. Email An icon of an mail envelope. Copy link A decentered black square over a white square.

Angus Robertson steps up calls for donation return

Angus Robertson
Angus Robertson

SNP Westminster leader Angus Robertson has renewed his call for the pro-union campaign Better Together to return a £500,000 donation of “dirty money”.

Ian Taylor, chief executive of oil trading company Vitol, made a large personal donation to the No campaign last year at the personal intervention of campaign leader Alistair Darling.

Now reports have emerged claiming the company has avoided paying corporation tax on billions of pounds of profits, allegedly with the blessing of HM Revenue and Customs.

But the donation had already been described as “dirty money” due to Vitol’s overseas deals. In 2007, Vitol was fined $17.5million by a New York court after admitting making payments to the national oil company in Saddam Hussein’s Iraq which were outside the UN oil for food programme.

The company has also been accused of paying $1million to notorious Serbian warlord Arkan to settle a score over a secret oil deal. Vitol has always denied any illegal activity.

Mr Robertson, MP for Moray, said Arkan has been indicted by the International Criminal Tribunal for “wilfully causing great suffering, cruel treatment, murder, willful killing, rape and other inhumane acts”.

Yesterday he renewed his call for the donation to be handed back.

“It is unbelievable that the No campaign is happy to accept these funds, and in light of these latest revelations Alistair Darling should at last do the decent thing and hand this donation back,” he said.

“The Taylor money was reportedly personally secured by Mr Darling, and if he does not hand this half-million pounds back, he is – as a former Chancellor – effectively condoning tax avoidance.”

A Better Together spokesman said the campaign had never received any money from Vitol.