Adnan Oktar (born 2 February 1956), also known as Harun Yahya, is a Turkish religious cult leader as well as an Islamic creationist. In 2007, he sent thousands of unsolicited copies of his book, The Atlas of Creation, which advocates Islamic creationism, to American scientists, members of Congress, and science museums. Oktar runs two organizations of which he is also the Honorary President: Bilim Araştırma Vakfı (BAV, literally, "Science Research Foundation", established 1990), which promotes creationism and Milli Değerleri Koruma Vakfı (literally, "National Values Preservation Foundation", established 1995) which works domestically on a variety of moral issues.
In more recent years, Adnan Oktar has performed televangelism on his TV channel, A9 TV, which featured 'kittens', his female devotees. His organization is commonly referred to as a cult, and he has been described by VICE magazine as the "most notorious cult leader in Turkey."[8] Oktar filed more than 5000 lawsuits against individuals for defamation from 2005 to 2015, which led to the blocking of a number of prominent websites in Turkey.
