Turkish Former Economy Czar Breaks Silence to Berate Critics

Turkey’s former finance minister broke months of silence that followed his abrupt resignation by threatening legal action against critics who say his policies cost the nation more than $100 billion in reserves.

“There is no possibility of any foreign currency or lira resources of the central bank disappearing, evaporating or being transferred to a different location,” a lawyer for Berat Albayrak, who is also President Recep Tayyip Erdogan’s son-in-law, said in a statement published Saturday. Albayrak’s attorney said he’d sue detractors for 500,000 liras ($71,000) for defamation and donate the compensation to the families of fallen soldiers.