Turkish police arrested 161 people suspected of belonging to the Islamic State group over the previous week in a sweeping operation that reached 38 provinces, Interior Minister Ali Yerlikaya said.
The arrests, announced on Friday, covered a wide geographic spread that included the capital Ankara and the country’s largest city, Istanbul. Yerlikaya said the suspects were active within the group or providing financial support to it, indicating that the operation was not limited to fighters or planners but also reached people tied to the organization’s logistics.
Authorities also seized unlicensed firearms, Islamic State documents and digital materials during the raids. That detail suggests investigators were not only making arrests but also gathering evidence that could be used to map contacts, financial links and other operational traces. The scale of the seizures was not quantified in the report, but the items found show the investigation extended beyond simple detention.
Turkey has long been exposed to Islamic State violence. AP noted that the group has carried out numerous attacks in the country over the past decade, including a double bombing at a political rally in 2015 that killed more than 100 people, the deadliest terror attack in Turkish history. That background helps explain why Turkish authorities continue to treat the group as a serious domestic security threat even after its territorial defeat in the Middle East.
The latest raid wave also underlines the government’s continued use of province-spanning counterterrorism sweeps. By distributing arrests across 38 of Turkey’s 81 provinces, police signaled that suspected networks or supporters were dispersed rather than concentrated in one urban center. The inclusion of both Ankara and Istanbul indicates that the operation reached major political and economic hubs as well as other regions.
Yerlikaya’s account did not say whether the detainees had been formally charged, nor did it specify when the alleged activity took place. It also did not identify any weapons or materials in detail beyond saying they were unlicensed firearms, Islamic State documents and digital items. Still, the announcement makes clear that Turkish officials are continuing a broad counter-Islamic State campaign built around arrests, evidence collection and repeated regional operations.
For Turkey, the significance is less in a single overnight bust than in the scale and geographic spread of the action. A weeklong wave of arrests across the country shows that the state still views Islamic State as an active security problem and is prepared to devote substantial police resources to it.
