A 41-year-old Turkish national and the former financial manager for a controversial gambling tycoon was shot and killed Thursday evening in a suburb of The Hague.
The man, Cemil Önal, had previously warned Dutch authorities that his life was in danger and claimed he was being targeted because of information he held regarding the bribery of Turkish politicians.
Dutch police confirmed on Friday they had launched a murder investigation after Önal’s shooting on the terrace of a hotel in Rijswijk. The suspect remains at large.
Önal had recently been released from detention in the Netherlands, where he had been held at the request of Turkey.
Turkey had been seeking his extradition in connection with the 2022 assassination of Halil Falyali, a controversial casino owner and alleged crime boss in Northern Cyprus.
Önal denied the assassination charges and told Follow the Money in interviews earlier this year that he believed Turkish authorities were pursuing him because he had knowledge of covert payments to senior officials.
“This will be the death of me,” he told Follow the Money days before his murder
Önal served for years as the financial manager of Falyali’s operations in Northern Cyprus, the part of the island backed by Turkey. These operations included luxury hotels and a network of illegal online gambling websites, which Önal claimed generated up to 80 million dollars a month per month.
In the days before his murder, Önal again raised concerns about his...
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