Photos of alleged bribery money seized in house of Turkish minister’s son revealed

ISTANBUL – Doğan News Agency

Radikal photo.

Daily Radikal has revealed photos allegedly taken during a raid on the house of Barış Güler, the son of Interior Minister Muammer Güler, where a large cache of U.S. dollars and Euros was seized by police.

In the pictures, thousands of U.S. dollars and Euros are seen in six safe boxes.

Turkish police capture 4.5 million dollars in the house of Halkbank manager

Police seized $4.5 million in cash this morning as part of a fraud and bribery raid in the house of Süleyman Aslan, the general manager of state-run lender Halkbank. 

The money was found hidden in shoe boxes in the library of Aslan’s house.

His wife Gülbahar Aslan, who was also detained yesterday, was released Dec. 18 after giving her testimony.

She was allegedly recorded saying “the greens arrived,” in a telephone conversation tracked by the police, judicial sources told the Doğan News Agency.
 
Turkish police have detained the sons of three Cabinet ministers yesterday as part of the wide-ranging investigation, which included a raid on the Ankara headquarters of one of Turkey’s largest banks, Halkbank.

Who is Süleyman Aslan?

Aslan is the Halkbank’s general manager and a board member. 

Aslan was born in 1970 in the Black Sea province of Çorum’s Osmancık district. He graduated from the Department of International Relations, Faculty of Economics and Administrative Sciences at Ankara’s Middle East Technical University.

He began his career in 1992 at the Ziraat Bank School of Banking, and then worked as a specialist in the Capital Markets Department at the same bank, as an assistant manager of the Istanbul Investment Securities Branch, after which he became a line manager of the Bonds and Bills Department of the same bank. 

Aslan was the general manager and a board member of Ziraat Asset Management, as well as the head of the Foreign Exchange and Money Markets Department at Ziraat Bank. Aslan was the general manager responsible for Treasury Management and International Banking between June 17, 2005 and July 15, 2011 and has been a board member and the general manager of Halk Bankası A.Ş. since July 15, 2011. He is also the chairman of Halk Hayat ve Emeklilik A.Ş.


Iran issue

Halkbank came to the agenda in April when it denied claims that it was carrying out operations that broke international sanctions on Iran. It issued an official statement on April 21 in denial of the claims, after local media reported that 47 members of the U.S. Senate had demanded sanctions on Halkbank over the claims. 

Some parts of the Turkish press reported that the U.S. Senate had started a “campaign against Turkey,” accusing it of raising its trade volume with Iran despite the U.S.-imposed sanctions on Iran due to its nuclear program. The reports claimed the campaign was led by the pro-Israel lobby AIPAC, along with the support of 47 senators, who sent a letter to both Secretary of State John Kerry and the Treasury Secretary Jack Lew recommending sanctions on Halkbank for its operations transferring gold to Iran.

Turkey, Iran’s biggest natural gas customer, has been paying Iran for energy imports in Turkish Liras, as sanctions prevent it from paying in dollars or euros.