Fredreka Schouten

USA TODAY

WASHINGTON — President Trump's former national security adviser Michael Flynn earned $530,000 last fall for consulting work that may have helped benefit the government of Turkey, according to new federal filings.

Flynn, fired last month from his White House post, formally registered as a foreign agent this week with the Justice Department and disclosed the details of his work for Inovo BV, a Dutch consulting firm owned by a Turkish businessman with ties to Turkey's President Recep Tayyip Erdogan.

Flynn's lawyer Robert Kelner said Flynn shut down his firm last year, but decided to register because his work for Inovo BV "could be construed to have principally benefited the Republic of Turkey."

The new documents show Inovo wrote six-figure checks to Flynn's firm in September and October as he served as a top national security aide on Trump's campaign. The final payment of $145,000 came on Nov. 14, 2016, just days after Trump captured the presidency.

As part of its contract with Inovo, the Flynn Intel Group hired researchers to examine Fethullah Gulen, a reclusive Islamic cleric who lives in exile in rural Pennsylvania. Erdogan has blamed Gulen's opposition group for an attempted 2016 coup and has sought his extradition. On Election Day, The Hill newspaper published a Flynn op-ed that called Gulen "radical cleric" and said the U.S. government should "not provide him a safe haven."

In its filings with the Justice Department, Flynn's firm said the op-ed was not published at the request of Inovo or the Turkish government but said Inovo did review a draft before Flynn submitted it.

Kelner said Flynn shut down the firm in mid-November.

On Twitter, Inovo founder Ekim Alptekin pushed back on the notion that Flynn's work benefited Turkish authorities, saying he never hired a lobbyist on behalf of the Turkish government and said neither he nor anyone in the country's government knew in advance about Flynn's op-ed.

Trump fired Flynn last month for misleading Vice President Pence about the nature of his discussions with Russia's ambassador to the United States.

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