User:Flemingdon/Kamil Ekim Alptekin

Kamil Ekim Alptekin (born 1977) is a Turkish businessman with real estate, aerospace, and consulting interests. He is the current Chairman of the Turkey-U.S. Business Council (TAİK) and an advocate for improved Turkish-American relations. His payments to Michael T. Flynn for research and lobbying work against the Gülen movement are central to an ongoing political controversy in American politics.

Early life and education
Alptekin was raised mostly in the Netherlands, his parents having left Turkey after the 1980 Turkish coup d'état, when he was 4. He studied law and economics at Utrecht University, graduating in 2001.

Career
He received a nine-month fellowship to work as a staffer on the United States House Committee on Foreign Affairs and for Representative Tom Lantos. He later worked for the Democrats 66 parliamentary group at the States General of the Netherlands in The Hague. He held a one year fellowship at the INTERPOL Counter-Terrorism Fusion Centre in Lyon. He was a senior fellow with the Humanity in Action non-profit, and founder of the Frieda Menco Foundation.

In 2005 Alptekin began a business providing counter-terrorism equipment and consulting services to the government of Turkey, including video surveillance cameras for police helicopters. He is involved in real estate development along the Bosphorus Strait in Istanbul.

He serves as an Honorary Consul to the Republic of Albania.

Eclipse
When Eclipse Aviation Corporation filed for bankruptcy, Alptekin and his partners attempted to buy it out with financing provided by the Russian state bank Vnesheconombank and a loan personally approved by Vladimir Putin. The Russian government financing ultimately fell through, and instead Alptekin and his partners bought Eclipse Aviation for $40 million, using it to found Eclipse Aerospace. Under Alptekin, Eclipse Aerospace began producing the Eclipse 550 very light jet, partnering with Sikorsky Aircraft.

Inovo BV
Inovo BV, the Dutch corporation he owns, is the sole Turkish representative in Ratio Oil Exploration, which is the Israeli firm exploring the Leviathan gas field in the Mediterranean Sea. Ratio has denied that it has any affiliation with Alptekin or Inovo BV, though BuzzFeed News has produced evidence documenting a relationship dating back to at least early 2016. Ratio spokesperson Orit Teicher told The Daily Caller that documents alleging a relationship between Ratio and Inovo were forgeries.

Lobbying against Gülenism
Following the 2016 Turkish coup d'état attempt, Alptekin began soliciting lobbyists in the United States in order to reduce support for Fethullah Gülen and the Gülen movement. One of those firms was Flynn Intel Group, which was paid at least $530,000 for its efforts. Whether or not Michael T. Flynn and Alptekin were formally lobbying for the government of Turkey remains an ongoing political controversy in the United States.

Mueller investigation
As part of his investigation of Russian interference in the 2016 United States elections, special prosecutor Robert Mueller assumed control of a Virginia-based grand jury criminal probe into the relationship between Flynn and Alptekin's Inovo BV.