Interior Minister Ali Yerlikaya announced on Monday that 81 suspects were captured in operations against the Gülenist Terror Group (FETÖ).
Detention warrants were issued by authorities in Istanbul, Ankara, Izmir, Diyarbakır and Balıkesir ahead of operations carried out in these cities, as well as in Bilecik, Bursa, Erzincan, Hatay, Kayseri, Kütahya, Manisa, Muğla, Sivas, Şanlıurfa and Rize. Yerlikaya said in a social media post that operations were a joint work of the police’s organized crime and intelligence units and were based on digital evidence obtained from a secret eyewitness in investigations on the terrorist group.
FETÖ is behind the defeated coup attempt on July 15, 2016, in which 252 people were killed and 2,734 were wounded. The attempt was plotted and carried out by FETÖ infiltrators in the military, aided by FETÖ’s “civilian” members.
Along with the 2016 coup attempt, FETÖ is also accused of being behind a long-running campaign to overthrow the state through the infiltration of Turkish institutions, particularly the military, police and judiciary.
Türkiye has targeted the terrorist group's active members and sleeper cells nonstop, and its influence has been much reduced since 2016. However, the group maintains a vast network, including infiltrators suspected of still operating within Turkish institutions.
FETÖ backers in army ranks and civil institutions have disguised their loyalty, as operations and investigations have indicated since the 2016 coup attempt. FETÖ is implicated in a string of cases related to its alleged plots to imprison its critics, money laundering, fraud and forgery.
The terrorist group faces operations almost daily as investigators still try to unravel its massive network of infiltrators everywhere. In 2025, more than 1,600 FETÖ suspects were arrested, while 1,524 other suspects were released under judicial control, according to figures from the Interior Ministry as of December.
Yerlikaya said on Monday that suspects captured in the latest operations included public officials, those in communication with each other through Bylock, an encrypted messaging app developed and exclusively used by FETÖ, and had records in companies linked to the terrorist group. Suspects were part of FETÖ’s secret network within law enforcement, Yerlikaya also said.
