Turkey Picks Ex-Banker Convicted in the U.S. as New Bourse CEO
Turkey Picks Ex-Banker Convicted in the U.S. as New Bourse CEO
(Bloomberg) -- Turkey chose former Halkbank executive Hakan Atilla, who served time in a U.S. jail over Iran sanctions breaches, to be the new chief executive officer of the Istanbul stock exchange.
The selection of Atilla, who returned to Turkey in July, was announced late Monday by Treasury and Finance Minister Berat Albayrak.
“Hakan Atilla, who has returned to the country after an unjust conviction, has come to end of his resting period,” Albayrak said in a tweet. “He’s starting his job as the CEO of Borsa Istanbul.”
Atilla was the head of international banking at Turkiye Halk Bankasi AS, as the state-owned lender is formally known, between 2011 and 2018. At Borsa Istanbul, he replaces Murat Cetinkaya, who was appointed as a deputy governor at the central bank on Aug. 30, according to a statement on the exchange’s website.
The former Halkbank executive was convicted by a New York court in early 2018 on allegations of helping Iran evade economic sanctions on billions of dollars of oil revenue. Atilla served 28 months in a U.S. prison and received a hero’s welcome from government officials on his release.
“This is a great day,” Albayrak, son-in-law of President Recep Tayyip Erdogan, told reporters at Istanbul airport when he greeted Atilla in July. “Our brother Hakan has returned home unscathed. He will have a good holiday, rest. Hopefully we’ll talk again in the coming days.” Erdogan telephoned Atilla upon his arrival back in Turkey.
Atilla’s naming to the role comes less than a week after U.S. prosecutors brought a criminal case against Halkbank in what appeared to some to be a reprimand for Ankara’s decision to send troops into Syria. In the indictment, the bank was accused of aiding a wide-ranging plot to violate prohibitions on Iran’s access to the U.S. financial system.
Halkbank rebuffed the accusations, saying the indictment appeared to largely repeat allegations used during Atilla’s trial and that it was part of the sanctions introduced over Turkey’s military operation in Syria.
--With assistance from Ugur Yilmaz.
To contact the reporter on this story: Tugce Ozsoy in Istanbul at tozsoy1@bloomberg.net
To contact the editors responsible for this story: Blaise Robinson at brobinson58@bloomberg.net, ;Onur Ant at oant@bloomberg.net, John Viljoen, Monica Houston-Waesch
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