Turkish police on Friday detained 29 people in coordinated raids across 14 provinces over alleged links to the faith-based Gülen movement, targeting what authorities described as its women’s education network, the state-run Anadolu news agency reported.
The operation, coordinated by the İzmir Chief Public Prosecutor’s Office, targeted 32 people accused of involvement in the movement’s alleged education network. Police detained 29 of them, while the remaining three were reportedly abroad. Authorities did not specify what educational activities formed the basis of the allegations.
Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan has targeted the faith-based Gülen movement, inspired by Muslim cleric Fethullah Gülen, who died in 2024, since corruption investigations in December 2013 implicated him as well as some members of his family and inner circle. He dismissed the probes as a Gülenist conspiracy and designated the movement as a terrorist organization in May 2016, intensifying a sweeping crackdown after a coup attempt in July of the same year that he accused Gülen of orchestrating. The movement denies involvement in the attempted coup or any terrorist activity.
Officers from the İzmir Police Department’s counterterrorism and intelligence units carried out simultaneous raids in İzmir, Manisa, Gaziantep, Şanlıurfa, Kocaeli, Afyonkarahisar, Bursa, Denizli, Isparta, Konya, Ankara, Yozgat, Antalya and Aydın.
Police seized numerous digital materials during searches of the properties. Authorities did not identify the detainees, explain what evidence linked them to the movement or provide information about their custody status beyond the initial detentions.
The latest detentions follow two separate operations earlier this week in which police detained 11 people over alleged Gülen links, including five accused of providing financial assistance to people allegedly associated with the movement and their families.
According to the latest figures from the justice ministry, more than 127,000 people have been convicted for alleged links to the movement, and authorities had initiated legal proceedings against 720,338 people since 2016, with 10,485 still in prison. Investigations or trials involving another 83,404 are still ongoing. In addition to the thousands who were jailed, scores of other Gülen movement followers had to flee Turkey to avoid the government crackdown.
