Banker convicted of evading sanctions

NEW YORK — A banker accused of helping Iran evade economic sanctions was convicted Wednesday in a case that strained ties between the United States and Turkey with its testimony about corruption at the highest levels of the NATO ally’s government.

Mehmet Hakan Atilla, a 47-year-old deputy general manager at Turkey’s state-run Halkbank, was charged by U.S. authorities with taking part in a complex scheme in which Iran traded its oil and gas for gold, with some of the proceeds moved through U.S. financial institutions without their knowledge.

He was convicted of four conspiracy counts, including conspiracy to defraud the United States, plus one bank fraud count. He was acquitted of a money laundering charge.

The prosecution’s star witness, Reza Zarrab, a Turkish-Iranian gold trader who admitted orchestrating the deals with Iran, testified that he paid over $50 million in bribes to Turkey’s finance minister in 2012 to advance the scheme and that he believed Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan knew about the plot.

Turkey’s leaders lashed out over the case throughout the trial, with Erdogan calling it an American conspiracy to “blackmail” and “blemish” his country. Turkey, a key strategic partner of the U.S. in the Mideast, has taken an increasingly authoritarian turn under Erdogan.