Clinton used private email at State Department - Report

Washington, March 4, (dpa/GNA) - Hillary Clinton, the undeclared frontrunner for the Democratic Party's 2016 presidential nomination, used only her private email for official business while she was secretary of state, The Washington Post reported Tuesday.

During her 2009-13 tenure as top US diplomat, Clinton did not have a government email address. She communicated both within the US government as well as with foreign leaders, in her private account, the Post reported.

The discovery was made by a House of Representatives committee investigating the 2012 terrorist attack on the US consulate in Benghazi, Libya. That generated the quest by the State Department to make sure her emails are properly archived.

The White House confirmed that Clinton used her personal email and said that her team had "completed in the last week or two" the process of making sure emails that pertained to official business were sent to the State Department for permanent preservation.

White House spokesman Josh Earnest defended her actions, noting that many of the emails were already captured inside the State Department system because she was mainly mailing within the department.

But he said he follows the practice of most high-ranking government officials of using only government email for government business, to avoid the tedious task of forwarding such mail.

The National Archives and Records Administration requires preservation of all emails sent or received from personal accounts of US officials for historic transparency.

Former secretary of state Colin Powell used personal email, the Post reported.

Jason Baron, former head of litigation at the National Archives, told the Post that he could recall "no instance" in his 2000-13 tenure when a high-ranking government executive used only a personal email account.

Clinton's expected bid for the left-leaning Democratic Party's 2016 presidential nomination has fuelled a number of investigative stories about her life and work.

In late February, the Post published a story analyzing contributions from foreign governments to the Clinton Foundation. She joined husband Bill's charity organization in 2013.

The Post documented donations of hundreds of millions of dollars from seven foreign governments during her tenure as secretary of state, raising questions about possible conflicts of interest in her diplomatic dealings.

US political candidates are forbidden to accept money from foreign governments and individuals. Donations from abroad to the foundation would be a way of gaining influence with Clinton while obeying the letter of the law, the Post wrote.

GNA