25-04-2024 03:15 PM Jerusalem Timing

Turkish Police Raid Suspected ISIL, PKK Militants in Istanbul

Turkish Police Raid Suspected ISIL, PKK Militants in Istanbul

Turkish police on Friday launched raids to arrest suspected members of the Takfiri group ISIL and Kurdish militants following a wave of deadly violence in the country.

Turkish police on Friday launched raids to arrest suspected members of the Takfiri group ISIL (so-called Islamic State in Iraq and Levant) and Kurdish militants following a wave of deadly violence in the country, the official Anatolia news agency said.Turkish policemen

Backed up by helicopters, police raided addresses in several Istanbul districts in search of members of ISIL, the Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK) and other militant groups, it added. The number arrested was not immediately clear.

The Dogan news agency said that 140 addresses were raided in 26 districts in Istanbul, in an operation involving some 5,000 police.

As well as ISIL and the PKK, the operation targeted suspected members of the PKK's youth wing, The Patriotic Revolutionary Youth Movement (YDG-H) and the Marxist Revolutionary People's Liberation Party Front (DHKP-C), Anatolia said.

The raids came after 32 people were killed in a suicide bombing Monday in a Turkish town on the Syrian border, blamed on ISIL.

This sparked an upsurge in violence in Turkey's Kurdish-dominated southeast, where many accuse the Turkish authorities of collaborating with ISIL, accusations Ankara denies.

Two police were shot dead in southeast Turkey close to the Syrian border on Wednesday, in an attack claimed by the PKK's military wing which said it wanted to avenge the Suruc bombing.

On Thursday, another policeman was killed in the majority Kurdish city of Diyarbakir.

Meanwhile, YDG-H claimed it had shot dead an alleged former ISIL militants in Istanbul late Tuesday.