Turkey said on Monday it had arrested 90 people with suspected links to the so-called Islamic State (IS) terrorist group, two weeks after a deadly shootout outside the Israeli consulate in Istanbul.
A total of 198 people were detained a day after the 7 April attack in a nationwide sweep against “the terrorist organisation Daesh,” the Arabic acronym for the group.
The 90 other suspects arrested in 24 of Turkey’s provinces include “members of the terrorist organisation,” and people “involved in its financing…and suspects disseminating propaganda,” the interior ministry said.
Authorities have not officially connected these arrests to the shootout outside the Israeli consulate in which two police officers were wounded.
One of the three gunmen, who was killed by the police, was linked “to a terrorist organisation that instrumentalises religion,” authorities said, without naming IS.
IS had previously carried out attacks in different parts of Turkey.
In 2015, suicide bombers working for the group attacked a peace rally in the capital Ankara, killing 103 people. It was revealed later that police had been warned before the attack but necessary precautions were not taken. Trials related to the attack are still ongoing.
And on New Year’s Eve 2017, 39 people lost their lives in an armed attack on a nightclub in Istanbul.
At the end of December, three Turkish police officers were killed during an anti-IS operation in the northwestern province of Yalova.
Six suspects, all Turkish nationals, were also shot dead in clashes that lasted several hours.
Additional sources • AFP