Turkish banker denies helping Iran to evade US sanctions
In make-or-break move, accused takes the stand in his own defence
For three weeks, Mehmet Hakan Atilla listened to evidence against him, including the testimony of a gold trader who described how the Turkish banker was behind a complex set of deals to allow Iran to evade American sanctions.
On Friday, it was Mr Atilla’s turn. In contrast with the tone so far, he presented himself in Manhattan’s district federal court as one executive among many, with a middling income and a modest family life.
When he was asked by his lawyer whether he was the “architect” of a scheme to allow Iran to access oil money held in Turkish banks, he said simply in Turkish: “I am not.”
American prosecutors have charged nine people with conspiring to help Iran evade sanctions using fraudulent gold and food deals worth hundreds of millions of dollars. Two have so far been arrested in the US.
Reza Zarrab, an Iranian-Turkish gold dealer, pleaded guilty and is co-operating with prosecutors, while Mr Atilla, 47, denies all of the charges against him.
His evidence began with a flourish, describing how he was on a flight to Barcelona in April 2013 when he was supposed to have received a crucial phone call.
Mr Zarrab had testified that he saw the general manager of Halkbank phone Mr Atilla and ask him to put through an illegal transaction.
Cathy Fleming, the banker’s defence lawyer, asked where he was at the time of the alleged call.
Mr Atilla answered: “I was on a plane.”
Ms Fleming said: “Did you receive a call on your cell phone?” “Never,” Mr Atilla said. He told the court his income was about $100,000 (Dh367,250) with no opportunities for bonuses. He described how his hobbies included fishing, painting, camping, watching films and reading.
The case has exacerbated tensions between the US and Turkey, which accuses Washington of concocting the allegations for political purposes.
The trial heard that former ministers received bribes and that president Recep Tayyip Erdogan, when prime minister, signed off on two banks being involved in the scheme.
The prosecution alleges that Mr Atilla’s role as deputy general manager at Halkbank, a state-owned bank, included expertise in sanctions which he used to build a web of deals to allow Iran to move its money out of Turkish accounts.
But on Friday Mr Atilla contradicted the claims, saying other departments were responsible for monitoring changes to sanctions.
During a break in evidence, Mr Atilla’s defence team asked Judge Richard Berman to order a mistrial after the appearance of a former Turkish police officer, who fled Turkey with evidence from his investigation into government officials.
The lawyers said his account of fleeing the country was “prejudicial” because it suggested Mr Atilla was associated with “cruel political violence”.
Mr Berman denied the request and instead suggested Huseyin Korkmaz’s testimony helped the defence, as he had said Mr Atilla had not appeared in surveillance as part of his investigation.
But he also admonished the defence for getting on the “conspiracy theory bandwagon” by trying to link Mr Korkmaz to Fethullah Gulen, the US-based cleric blamed by the Turkish government for last year’s attempted coup, which he said “had no basis in evidence presented so far”.