Turkey’s opposition claims millions funneled to US through foundations close to president
CHP leader Kemal Kilicdaroglu claims President Recep Tayyip Erdogan plans to leave Turkey in event of election defeat.
ISTANBUL — Turkish opposition leader Kemal Kilicdaroglu has explosively claimed that millions of dollars have been siphoned off to allow President Recep Tayyip Erdogan to flee the country if he loses the upcoming election.
In a video posted on Twitter Tuesday night, Kilicdaroglu, who heads the Republican People’s Party (CHP), said the equivalent of $61 million was being transferred “all of a sudden” to the United States through education foundations close to the president.
Members of Erdogan’s ruling Justice and Development Party (AKP) and the foundations strongly denied the allegations, with party spokesperson Omer Celik accusing Kilicdaroglu of conducting a “slander campaign.”
Emre Yilmaz, a senior CHP member, later posted what purported to be documents from the US Department of Justice’s Foreign Agent Registration Act unit that showed individual transfers of up to $10.8 million between September 2014 and July 2020.
