The largest bank in Turkey refused to use the Mir payment system

The Turkish bank İşbank (Türkiye İş Bankası - Approx. "Cold" ) - the largest bank in Turkey in terms of assets, announced that it had suspended work with the Russian payment system Mir.

The bank said that they made such a decision because of the US Treasury Department, which threatened with sanctions to companies that use Mir cards outside of Russia.

On the evening of September 19, İşbank and DenizBank ATMs stopped issuing Turkish lira from Mir cards. At the same time, there were no statements in DenizBank regarding the termination of support for the payment system.

Five largest banks worked with the Mir system in Turkey - Vakifbank, Ziraat Bank, DenizBank, Halkbank and İşbank. At the moment, lira can only be withdrawn in three banks.

In early September, the Financial Times wrote that the United States and the European Union fear that Russia could bypass Western sanctions through the Turkish banking sector through Russia.

Source: Bloomberg HT , TASS ( 1 , 2 ), Financial Times