Reza Zarrab, a confidant of Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan, has pleaded guilty in federal court to an unspecified charge. Zarrab had been in U.S. custody since March 2016, when he was arrested at the Miami Airport by the FBI. The U.S. Justice Department alleged Zarrab to be intimately involved in a plot to use the gold trade to help Iran evade sanctions.
The Zarrab case, and the guilty plea, are crucially important. Court documents reveal Zarrab’s close relationship to the Turkish president. Erdogan may be the most corrupt leader Turkey has had — which is telling given the level of corruption Turkey has experienced over the decades.
Under Erdogan’s watch, billions of dollars have gone missing. Leaked recordings of phone calls show Erdogan and his son talking about how to hide $1 billion in cash stashed in their house when the Turkish leader thought prosecutors might raid it. Erdogan subsequently responded by cracking down on judicial independence and the press. He has repeatedly denied the veracity of the hundreds of hours of leaked calls and transcripts implicating him in corruption. That a U.S. court, however, appears to believe much of the evidence that Erdogan claims was manufactured, however, is a blow to the Turkish leader.
The idea that someone would fabricate so much at so many different times has always beggared belief, but now it seems that U.S. technical experts appear to deem the evidence of Erdogan’s corruption real, the denials Erdogan make to his pet domestic press notwithstanding. More broadly speaking, the acceptance of the evidence demonstrates Erdogan’s constant blaming of ally-turned-opponent Fethullah Gulen, a Pennsylvania-based Islamic cleric, for any ill affecting the Turkish leader has little traction outside of Turkey.
Then there is what the Zarrab conviction means: While the case against his associate is ongoing, Zarrab’s plea appears to confirm that Turkey (in theory a NATO ally) worked to undercut and undermine sanctions against the Islamic Republic of Iran out of both ideological spite and the personal greed of Erdogan and his family. In addition, there is the question of what Iran did with some of the money it received out of the Zarrab scheme: It seems likely that the sanctions-busting helped fund terrorist organizations like Hezbollah or Iranian-backed militias which in turn have murdered Americans. Diplomats might try to obfuscate that fact but, fortunately, the U.S. judiciary remains independent and so is less prone to moral wavering than Foggy Bottom.
With evidence so overwhelmingly against him, Zarrab understood he had little choice but to plead guilty. Indeed, this may be why he flew to Miami in the first place: Both Tehran and Ankara might kill him to silence him had he remained in either country.
While he faced prison in the U.S., he also understood his best chance remained in a society in which rule of law is paramount. The question now will turn to the case against his former co-defendant, Turkish banking executive Mehmet Hakan Atilla. Whether or not Atilla also pleads guilty, what will happen next will expose the internal and political rot afflicting the Turkish banking sector and show that responsibility for money laundering goes to the very top in Turkey.
Erdogan may see himself as a great leader but, in the world’s eyes, he is quickly becoming little better than the late Panamanian dictator Manuel Noriega.
Michael Rubin (@Mrubin1971) is a contributor to the Washington Examiner’s Beltway Confidential blog. He is a resident scholar at the American Enterprise Institute and a former Pentagon official.
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