A Turkish businessman has been sentenced to 27 months in a US jail for exporting US-made marine equipment to Iran in violation of US sanctions.
Resit Tavan, the owner of the Istanbul-based Turkish business Ramor Dis Ticaret, had originally pleaded guilty to the charge in April.
The offences, which took place between 2013 and 2015, are said to have involved him acquiring a range of marine related equipment that had been manufactured in Wisconsin by US companies, including high powered outboard engines, marine power generators and power boat propulsion equipment known as surface drives, on behalf of the Iran-based Qeshm Madkandalou Shipbuilding Cooperative (Madkanadalou).
Evidence introduced in the Federal District Court in Milwaukee, Wisconsin allegedly showed that Tavan had worked in cooperation with Iranian officers associated with Madkandalou to use some of this US origin marine equipment to support the construction and development of a prototype high-speed missile attack boat for the Iranian military or naval forces.
Tavan and the Ramor Group are alleged to have “worked in concert with Iranian officials” to procure US origin marine equipment and “illegally export it to Iran” by using the Ramor Group in Turkey to receive the goods and thereafter re-export it to Madkandalou in Iran, in violation of US sanctions.
At the sentencing hearing, the District Court Judge indicated that Tavan’s conspiracy to violate US sanctions by procuring marine equipment for military purposes represented a serious threat to US national security.
“At no time did anyone involved in these transactions obtain permission from the US Department of Treasury, Office of Foreign Assets Control or the US Department of Commerce to export any US-origin marine equipment from the United States to Iran,” the US Department of Justice said in a statement.
A co-defendant charged in the same indictment, Fulya Kalafatoglu Oguzturk, a Turkish citizen, is said to remain at large as a fugitive.
