Türkiye arrests 90 people with suspected links to ISIL

ANKARA

Türkiye on April 20 said it had arrested 90 people with suspected links to ISIL terror group, two weeks after a deadly shootout outside the Israeli consulate in Istanbul.

A total of 198 people were detained a day after the April 7 attack in a nationwide sweep against "the terrorist organisation Daesh", another name for the ISIL terror group.

The 90 other suspects arrested in 24 of Türkiye's 81 include "members of the terrorist organization,... 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 organization that instrumentalises religion," the authorities said, without naming ISIL.

At the end of December, three Turkish police officers were killed during an anti-ISIL operation in the northwestern province of Yalova.

Six suspects, all Turkish nationals, were also shot dead in clashes that lasted several hours.