WASHINGTON — The Treasury Department slapped sanctions on a bank in Turkey Friday in the latest effort to squeeze Iran into submission, The Post has learned.
The Istanbul-based Golden Global Bank allegedly moved large sums paid by China for Iranian oil, funneling the proceeds to the powerful Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC).
The sanctions affecting a financial institution in a NATO ally mark an escalation of Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent’s “Operation Economic Outcast,” which aims to apply such severe economic pain that the Iranian regime either submits to a peace deal or collapses.
“Financial institutions continue to find out the hard way that we are serious about Operation Economic Outcast,” Bessent said of Friday’s action.
“While we hope no more banks will need to be sanctioned, that ultimately depends on how quickly the international community comes to its senses and ceases support of the murderous Iranian regime,” he added.
“We know who you are, we know where you are, and we will continue to take action together with our allies and partners until we have buried the head of the Iranian snake.”
Golden Global Bank, founded in 2019, bills itself as “Turkey’s first investment bank that conducts all its activities in accordance with interest-free finance principles,” a nod to Islam’s ban on charging interest.
The bank is Turkey’s 35th largest and has a market share of less than a tenth of a percent, according to the financial information website TheBanks.EU, which says Golden Global controls the equivalent of $517 million in assets.
“This bank has been warned for years,” said Gene Lange, acting Treasury Department under secretary for terrorism and financial intelligence.
“We have repeatedly warned these entities, and today’s action makes clear that those warnings have consequences. This is a message to everyone else: the secretary means every single word he said at the press conference announcing Operation Economic Outcast.”
Although Golden Global bills itself as a professional outfit, the Treasury determined the bank was set up as part of Iran’s shadowy “rahbar” exchange network of front organizations that “transfer oil revenues from China to Turkey, where it could then be converted to cash and gold,” according to a document explaining the action.
The department said that the bank and its subsidiaries “facilitated tens of millions of dollars’ worth of transactions for the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps-Qods Force (IRGC-QF) and provide the Iranian regime with key correspondent banking access that allows it to move its funds internationally.”
This is believed to be the first time the US has sanctioned a bank in Turkey, though Manhattan federal prosecutors in 2019 charged Halkbank, Turkey’s fourth-largest bank, with helping Iran evade sanctions. That case ended in a legal settlement earlier this year.
The sanctions disconnect Golden Global from the international financial system and have “severed the Iranian regime’s critical financial lifelines” in Turkey, according to the Treasury.
Whether the Turkish government is taking corresponding action to seize the bank’s assets was not immediately clear.
Foreign governments often get a heads-up from the US and try to stall or derail sanctions plans. It’s unclear whether Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan spoke with President Trump about the punishment.
Other Treasury Department actions as part of Operation Economic Outcast have targeted financial institutions in the United Arab Emirates that allegedly serviced Iranian clients.
