An unusual revenue growth has been observed at the U.S. FETÖ compound, which is located in Saylorsburg, Pennsylvania, on the basis of tax-exemption declarations submitted by the Gülenist terror cult (FETÖ).
The figures, provided by tax exemption documents submitted to U.S. authorities, show a rapid increase in income for the U.S.-based terrorist organization FETÖ, starting in the year 2013.
The FETÖ terrorist organization has had its headquarters, the Golden Generation Worship and Retreat Center (GGWRC) in the Pocono Mountains of Pennsylvania, since the relocation of its leader Fetullah Gülen to the United States in 1999.
The organization is listed as non-profit with U.S. authorities, which means that it is exempt from taxes, but it must declare its assets and total yearly income through the submission of a relevant form to the Internal Revenue Service (IRS).
The GGWRC, a strictly guarded compound situated on about 10 hectares of land, indicated a revenue of $914,376 for 2013, $1,587,495 for 2014 and $5,263,435 for the year 2015. The significant revenue increase is not accompanied by a similar growth of expenditures, which went up only slightly from $929,378 in 2014 to $970,903 in 2015. According to the tax exemption declarations, the total assets of the GGWRC amount to $6,211,949.
The revenue increase comes at the same time that some FETÖ executives deserted Turkey in order to escape court cases that had been opened against them by Turkish authorities and to evade arrest warrants.
The key names indicated on the tax-exemption forms point to a link between developments in Turkey and the organization's rise in revenue in the U.S. In addition to Joseph A. Polat as an authorized person and Hüseyin Çopur as president, an individual named Sezai Şablak has been listed as vice president on the form.
Şablak is to be judged on charges of "membership of an armed terrorist organization" and "resistance to the law against the prevention of financing terrorism" by Ankara's 4th Aggravated Felony Court. At the same time, Şablak is known in the U.S. to be active on behalf of companies operating in various branches. GGWRC's vice president appears to be involved in a rather non-transparent network of companies and firms, some of which apparently have the same phone numbers as the GGWRC.