The US Justice has charged the state-owned Turkish bank Halkbank with accusing it of billions of dollars of fraud, money laundering and Iranian sanctions. The bank's "daring" approach was supported by senior Turkish government officials who had injected millions of dollars in bribes, New York prosecutor Geoffrey Berman said.
According to the indictment Halkbank should have shifted from 2012 to 2016 about 20 billion US dollars in Iranian funds, which is the equivalent of about 18.1 billion euros.
Turkish Bank Charged in Manhattan Federal Court for Its Participation in a Multibillion-Dollar Iranian Sanctions Evasion Scheme https://t.co/uSx8pbRCD1
- Justice Department (@ TheJusticeDept) October 15, 2019Judicial action comes at a time when relations between Washington and Ankara are severely strained. The background is the Turkish invasion in northern Syria.
An employee of the Turkish Embassy in Washington told Reuters, "This indictment is an additional step that does not have a positive effect on the current relations between the US and Turkey."
Erdogan: Will never explain ceasefire
With the withdrawal of its troops from northern Syria, the US had paved the way for a Turkish offensive in the area. After the start of the military offensive, US President Donald Trump had repeatedly urged his Turkish counterpart Recep Tayyip Erdogan to stop the process. Erdogan refused that again.
"We will never declare a ceasefire," he said on Tuesday after a CNN-Türk report in conversation with journalists on their return from a visit to Azerbaijan. The Turkish troops would first have to reach their destination - and that would be the establishment of a protection zone along the border.
On Wednesday, US Vice President Mike Pence, along with Secretary of State Mike Pompeo, set out on a mediation mission in the conflict between Turkey and the Kurdish militias in northern Syria. For Thursday, according to the White House, a meeting of pence with Erdogan is planned.
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The US Justice has previously cracked down on senior Halkbank employees, including former Vice Chairman Hakan Atilla. He was sentenced to 32 months imprisonment in New York in 2018, but was transferred to Turkey in July - where, among other things, the Minister of Finance welcomed him as a hero.
Erdogan had severely criticized Atilla's verdict. The banker's lawsuit severely damaged relations between Turkey and the United States. A Turkish-Iranian gold trader, Reza Zarrab, was initially a co-defendant, but later cooperated and then said, inter alia, against Attila. At the time, he also stated that Erdogan, in his time as Prime Minister, agreed to the bank's illegal operations in 2012.