Bijan R. Kian ( Persian: بیژن کیان; born January 15, 1952), sometimes written Bijan Rafiekian (بیژن رفیعی‌کیان), is an

Iranian-American Iranian Americans are United States citizens or nationals who are of Iranian ancestry or who hold Iranian citizenship. Iranian Americans are among the most highly educated people in the United States. They have historically excelled in bus ...

businessman, who is based in

San Juan Capistrano San Juan Capistrano ( Spanish for " St. John of Capistrano") is a city in Orange County, California, located along the Orange Coast. The population was 34,593 at the 2010 census. San Juan Capistrano was founded by the Spanish in 1776, when St. ...

California California is a state in the Western United States, located along the Pacific Coast. With nearly 39.2million residents across a total area of approximately , it is the most populous U.S. state and the 3rd largest by area. It is also the ...

. He has been an executive or board member of many businesses and organizations.Executive Profile: Bijan R. Kian
at bloomberg.com Kian was a member of the Board of Directors of the

Export–Import Bank of the United States The Export–Import Bank of the United States (EXIM) is the official export credit agency (ECA) of the United States federal government. Operating as a wholly owned federal government corporation, the bank "assists in financing and facilitating ...

from 2006 to 2011,Professional Banker, Business Executive and Educator sworn-in as newest board member at Export-Import Bank of the United States
Ex-Im Bank press release, 9 Oct 2006Ex-Im Bank History
Export Import Bank of the United States web site. Archived at the Wayback Machine on 23 Jan 2015 after being nominated by President

George W. Bush George Walker Bush (born July 6, 1946) is an American politician who served as the 43rd president of the United States from 2001 to 2009. A member of the Republican Party, Bush family, and son of the 41st president George H. W. Bush, he ...

and receiving Senate confirmation. Kian was a partner of retired

United States Army The United States Army (USA) is the land warfare, land military branch, service branch of the United States Armed Forces. It is one of the eight Uniformed services of the United States, U.S. uniformed services, and is designated as the Army o ...

Lieutenant General Lieutenant general (Lt Gen, LTG and similar) is a three-star military rank (NATO code OF-8) used in many countries. The rank traces its origins to the Middle Ages, where the title of lieutenant general was held by the second-in-command on the ...

Michael Flynn Michael Thomas Flynn (born December 24, 1958) is a retired United States Army lieutenant general and conspiracy theorist who was the 24th U.S. National Security Advisor for the first 22 days of the Trump administration. He resigned in light of ...

in the

Flynn Intel Group The Flynn Intel Group is a lobbying group established by Michael Flynn in October 2014. Flynn registered the company from the home of his friend Stanley A. McChrystal, a "fellow general-turned-consultant." Kamil Ekim Alptekin, a Turkish businessma ...

and worked with the incoming Trump administration's transition team on matters relating to the

Office of the Director of National Intelligence The director of national intelligence (DNI) is a senior, cabinet-level United States government official, required by the Intelligence Reform and Terrorism Prevention Act of 2004 to serve as executive head of the United States Intelligence Comm ...

. The US Special Counsel's office opened an investigation into Flynn and the Flynn Intel Group, including Kian, in 2017. On December 17, 2018, several months after Flynn entered into a cooperation agreement with the Special Counsel's office, and two weeks after Flynn pleaded guilty in federal court for lying to the FBI, Kian and Kamil Ekim Alptekin were indicted in US federal court. Kian was charged with illegally acting as an unregistered agent of a foreign government and for lobbying the

United States The United States of America (U.S.A. or USA), commonly known as the United States (U.S. or US) or America, is a country primarily located in North America. It consists of 50 U.S. state, states, a Washington, D.C., federal district, five ma ...

on behalf of

Turkey Turkey ( tr, Türkiye ), officially the Republic of Türkiye ( tr, Türkiye Cumhuriyeti, links=no ), is a list of transcontinental countries, transcontinental country located mainly on the Anatolia, Anatolian Peninsula in Western Asia, with ...

to extradite

Fethullah Gülen Muhammed Fethullah Gülen (born 27 April 1941) is a Turkish Islamic religious scholar, scholar, preacher, and a one-time opinion leader, as de facto leader of the Gülen movement. Gülen is designated an influential Neo-Ottomanism, neo-Ottoman ...

, who lives in the U.S., to Turkey, where Gülen was blamed for orchestrating a failed coup in 2016. Kian pleaded not guilty. The trial began on July 15, 2019. Contractors of the intel company gave testimony in the trial of the subject, which revealed the subject had requested surveillance of Gülen supporters, investigations of terrorist connections, and classified FBI documents on Gülen. Kian was found guilty and convicted on July 23, 2019. However, on September 24, 2019, Judge Anthony Trenga of the

Eastern District of Virginia The United States District Court for the Eastern District of Virginia (in case citations, E.D. Va.) is one of two United States district courts serving the Virginia, Commonwealth of Virginia. It has jurisdiction over the Northern Virginia, H ...

dismissed the indictment against Bijan Rafiekian, citing insufficient evidence. The U.S. 4th Circuit Court of Appeals reinstated the conviction on March 18, 2021.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Kian, Bijan 21st-century American businesspeople American people of Iranian descent Living people Trump administration personnel 1952 births Businesspeople from Tehran People from San Juan Capistrano, California

See also

References