NEW YORK (Reuters) - Colombian pop star Shakira announced a $40 million donation on Thursday to repair damage caused by an earthquake in Peru and a hurricane in Nicaragua. The singer, widely known for her single “Hips Don’t Lie,” revealed the donation from a foundation she co-founded during a summit on global climate change and development organized by former U.S. president Bill Clinton in New York.
Shakira is the co-founder of the Latin America for Solidarity Foundation, ALAS, which means wings in Spanish, with Nobel Prize winning author Gabriel Garcia Marquez.
“I’ve seen first-hand many of the challenges facing Latin America,” she said in a statement.
The two-time Grammy Award winner, who started another foundation to help poor children in Colombia when she was only 18, said 40 million infants do not go to school and 51 million people don’t have access to clean water in Latin America.
“These are challenging problems that no one person can address, but working together everyone can help make a difference,” she added. (more…)