Journalists point to that law! How did Turkey become a hub for organized crime groups?

The presence of drugs, money laundering, and gangs in Turkey has recently been on the public agenda. The data published by Interior Minister Ali Yerlikaya on his social media account every morning—detailing dismantled gangs and drug raids—serves as proof of this situation. So, how did Turkey reach this point? Sercan Meriç from BirGün spoke with Ozan Gündoğdu, Timur Soykan, and Murat Ağırel.

"I WILL NOT ASK WHERE YOU FOUND IT"

Ozan Gündoğdu: We call money obtained from criminal activities "dirty money." Money laundering is a crime in itself. This is the crime sector. To use this money, it must be introduced into the system. For example, the business of Ayhan Bora Kaplan, who was arrested recently, was running luxury venues in Ankara. It is probable that the dirty money of other gangs was also being laundered in these luxury venues. It is easy to launder dirty money in places that conduct business in cash. Following the coup attempt we experienced in July 2016, Turkey went through an extraordinary period. One of the pillars of this extraordinary period was the economy. A law passed by the AKP in August 2016 could not be debated at the time. That law was called "Wealth Amnesty." By passing this law, they essentially said, "You can bring your money to Turkey; I will not ask you where you found this money." At that time, the economic management and economic bureaucracy communicated that this situation was temporary. It was claimed to be an extraordinary period. The goal was to bring money from abroad into the country and introduce unregistered money into the system. The law passed in August 2016 was for one year, then it was extended for 6 months. Since 2016, 6 wealth amnesty laws have been passed.

The Central Bank measures the money entering and leaving the country and creates a balance of payments accordingly. When the end of the day comes, a sum of money appears that it cannot record or track the movement of. This money should be incidental. For a country like Turkey with a 1 trillion dollar Gross National Product (GNP) and a 40 billion dollar current account deficit, we would consider it normal for 500 million or 1 billion dollars to be recorded as a discrepancy. For example, they come to the market and shop here. It is impossible to measure, but at the end of the day, that money exists. In 2022, this amount reached 25 billion dollars. This was an amount never seen before in the history of the Republic.

"THESE GANGS MEAN ECONOMIC ASSETS"

Since Ali Yerlikaya took office, he has dismantled over 40 gangs. This many gangs also mean economic assets. 4 billion liras were seized from the Comanchero gang alone. The money you call 4 billion liras is about 300 million dollars. When we combine it with other gangs, the crime economy is significant for the Turkish economy. If you put all these gangs together, with a rough calculation, the size of the Turkish crime economy—including illegal betting, drug money, etc.—is 10 billion dollars in total. This is 1 percent of this economy, which is a large amount. If you completely end the crime economy, you shrink by 1 percent. This is a major event. Nowhere in the world should the ratio of the crime economy to GNP be this large.

"MONEY TRANSFERS STARTED HAPPENING THROUGH TURKEY"

Timur Soykan: Since the day it was founded, the AKP government has aimed to build a regime of rent-seeking and plunder. While building this, it became a structure dependent on hot money. In 2008, the flow of hot money to developing countries like Turkey continued, then it ended. That ended, but the AKP's need for hot money did not. The latest wealth amnesty was a text containing articles that no longer hid its purpose and fully revealed it, with all 11 of its articles. They stated they would not ask for the source of the money. Drug, prostitution, arms trafficking money, whatever it may be. They also gave a guarantee that no investigation would be opened regarding this. Along with this guarantee, they stated they would not collect the 2 percent tax that was previously taken. This is a choice. Everyone knows that when you take this step, it is no different from inviting the world's mafias to Turkey. It was an offer to the world mafia to invest your money in Turkey. And indeed, that is what happened. Simultaneously with this, the Syrian War created change and resources in this regard. Especially the money transfers of ISIS and jihadist structures started to happen through Turkey.

"THEY ARE OPENING CURRENCY EXCHANGE OFFICES FOR DIRTY MONEY TRANSFERS"

The most important and another reason for the mafia settling in Turkey is the process of making citizenship very cheap, which actually operates in coordination with the "Wealth Amnesties." I think since 2018, you could become a citizen if you bought a house for 250 thousand dollars; now it is 400 thousand dollars. Now you can bring your dirty money. Along with the dirty money, the dirty owners also come. You give them citizenship. This was also abused. Citizenship sold very cheaply turns into armor. It turns into an invaluable armor for international crime barons. Turkey has truly turned into a mafia base. Look, the killing of Vukotić in broad daylight in Mecidiyeköy, Istanbul, is a move that will change the drug market not just in Europe, but in the world. The rival who killed him, also a gang based in Montenegro like Vukotić, was also caught in Istanbul. You look, they all get residence permits. You see that Vukotić obtained citizenship with a fake identity. This is another issue that is abused. Swedish drug baron Rawa Majid has committed very brutal murders in Sweden, has brought certain areas under his influence, and has been Sweden's most important agenda item for 3 years. We have become known in Sweden from speaking to Swedish television; this man is that much on the agenda. As we saw in the Vukotić murder, local criminal organizations commit crimes together with international organizations. They enter their protection. It makes them grow. They also help them in laundering drug money and dirty money traffic. This is something reached with this latest Comanchero criminal organization, and in all of them, we see that they have currency exchange offices. The Australian criminal organization is opening a currency exchange office in Istanbul to be able to transfer dirty money.

"EVEN IF YOU INTERVENE, THEY WILL BE FREE TOMORROW"

Dutch drug barons were also all in Turkey. These are very big barons. They are people who have taken an important place in European drug traffic. We see that their dirty money has been directed towards hotels, buildings, and various purchases in Bodrum. Assets worth 1 billion TL were seized. An operation was carried out, and 29 people were detained. And this was a small part of these assets, I am sure of it. 28 out of 29 people were released. It is necessary to see that dirty money is increasing along with heroin and cocaine, and at the same time, a much larger dirty money dynamic is being formed with illegal betting. Now Ali Yerlikaya says, "The mafia's money has reached a point that will threaten capital; we need to push it back." Can you do this? I am not sure at all. You cannot wash with dirty hands. This is not a system, the regime is dirty now. The cadres are dirty. The state is dirty. The state has rotted. Even if you intervene, they will be free tomorrow. We are talking about a system that has rotted the state and has gone quite deep and climbed to the top."

"A GIANT NETWORK EMERGES BEFORE YOU"

Murat Ağırel: These monies are entered in some way through the invoice method into luxury beauty salons on the market or firms in the cosmetics sector that appear to be exporting. How does it happen, for example? You have 500 million TL of dirty money. You want to put it into the system, legalize it, and take it; you give it to the person who can launder 500 million TL. They issue an invoice as if they have made a sale with that money. If they issue a 90 million invoice, 90 million of the 500 million in your pocket goes to that person in cash. After all, there is no "where did you find it" law. 90 million goes to company accounts and the other firm as payment. First strike. You legalized the money because you did business. In this way, along with all the companies, it obtained a profit share within this sector. The company doing this also receives a commission.

We are talking about a country where the poverty line competes with the hunger line and the minimum wage remains only in name. Therefore, the comfortable lives of these people have become questionable. All citizens are asking what the source of this money is. Well, the source of this money is dirty money. We see that they have reached an incredibly large monetary wealth in short periods. There is no explanation for the source of this. You ask where the state is. We, journalists and lawyers, start investigating the answer to the question of where they find this money. Therefore, a giant network emerges before you.

"DİLAN POLAT IS JUST THE NAME OF THE SYSTEM"

For virtual betting, the former Interior Minister mentioned 55 billion TL. Later, it was said that this was 550 billion TL. These are very huge figures. In Turkey, 5 million users are still playing virtual betting. Entry to these sites was previously 20-30 TL; it increased to figures like 200 TL. When you multiply it by 5 million, it is a huge figure. In the Dilan Polat case, it was determined that the Polat family had ties to Derkan Başer, who lives as a fugitive in Georgia and is frequently mentioned in the virtual betting world. The Dilan Polat issue is actually the massive enrichment of a family whose economic situation was not very good. Dilan Polat is just the name of the system. There are hundreds of people who look like Dilan Polat.

"MANAGER TIES SHOULD BE INVESTIGATED"

A club's fan coming to the match should be its greatest desire. But when I researched, Tuzlaspor's tickets cannot be selected on Passolig; this means they are sold. I asked this too; they appear sold, but 3 people are watching the match. The ticket price for the Eyüpspor match is 50 thousand liras, and for the Erzurumspor match, it is 5 thousand liras. These figures are amounts that do not even exist in the Super League, but a first-league team is offering tickets for sale at this price. The tickets also appear sold on Passolig. I asked why. When I asked this, there was discomfort. A denial came. The Turkish Football Federation (TFF) stated that it was not interested and that Passolig was dealing with the issue. The claim is this: The President of Tuzlaspor has a very successful team in Bulgaria. At the same time, it is alleged that there is a betting site there. He is the president of both Tuzlaspor and Diyarbekirspor here. We are questioning a system. Especially the lower league teams in Turkey need to be examined one by one. Manager ties should be investigated. How many teams the owners of football clubs have, and what happens in the matches of these teams should be examined one by one. The fight against armed and drug gangs is also an internalized organized work related to the destruction of dirty money.

News Source: 12punto