Treasury exposes Turkey's aid to Daesh

On Tuesday the Department of the Treasury’s Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC) designated Muhammad Dandi Adhiguna, an Indonesian national who lives in Turkey’s central province of Kayseri, as a financial facilitator who helped move funds for ISIS.

The information provided by OFAC shows that ISIS is able to finance its militants and operations in the north of Syria, especially in areas where the Turkish Armed Forces (TSK) and its affiliated armed groups exert control.

Similar findings were also noted by UN Security Council sanction committee reports which stated that both ISIS and al-Qaeda have managed to raise funds in areas under Turkey’s jurisdiction.

According to the OFAC designation, Adhiguna, 26, has been working closely with Dwi Dahlia Susanti, an Indonesian woman and ISIS financial facilitator. Adhiguna helped her not only in financial matters but also in operational methods. 

Within the triangle of Turkey, Indonesia and Syria, the two worked together in delivering cash to ISIS cells to enable family members of ISIS to move into more secure areas in Idlib, Deir ez-Zor and Raqqa as well as to recruit young men to the ranks of ISIS.

The US move came amid the 16th meeting of the Counter ISIS Finance Group (CIFG) of the Global Coalition to Defeat ISIS, a group of nearly 70 countries and international organizations led by the US, Italy and Saudi Arabia.

“Treasury has taken action to expose and disrupt an international facilitation network that has supported ISIS recruitment, including the recruitment of vulnerable children in Syria,” said Under Secretary of the Treasury for Terrorism and Financial Intelligence Brian E. Nelson.

“The United States, as part of the Global Coalition to Defeat ISIS, is committed to denying ISIS the ability to raise and move funds across multiple countries,” he added.

ISIS is likely to have received from more than 40 countries have sent money to ISIS-linked individuals in Syria in what the US believes to be in support of ISIS’s future resurgence.

The designation identified the al-Hawl displacement camp in the north of Syria where ISIS members received up to $20,000 per month, with a majority of the funding coming through Turkey.“ISIS is particularly focused on smuggling children out of displaced persons camps for recruitment as fighters,” the US noted.

Secretary of State Antony Blinken said Monday that by designating them, the Biden administration aims “to expose and disrupt an international ISIS facilitation network that has financed ISIS recruitment, including of vulnerable children in Syria.”

Kayseri, a conservative province in the heart of Turkey where Adhiguna is based, is a stronghold of the ruling Justice and Development Party (AKP), led by President Erdoğan. is stationed, as well as a stronghold of al-Qaida and ISIS extremists.

Thousands of militants, both Turkish and foreign, have used Turkish territory to cross into Syria with the help of smugglers in order to fight alongside ISIS groups there. 

Turkish intelligence agency MIT (Milli İstihbarat Teşkilatı) has facilitated their travel, through the border province of Kilis in southeastern Turkey, one of the main crossing points into territory controlled by the terrorist group.