Police hunt for 16 FETÖ-linked suspects in 4 cities

TURKISH police are looking to detain some 16 suspects linked to the Gülenist Terror Group (FETÖ) in the capital Ankara and three other cities.

Ankara’s Chief Public Prosecutor’s Office yesterday said in a statement that it had charged the suspects with serving FETÖ’s “current financial formation” based on their testimonies expressing active remorse, decryption of their digital materials, technical and physical pursuit, and identification through statements and photographs taken so far.

Meanwhile, authorities detained six other FETÖ-linked suspects across five provinces in an ongoing investigation by the Konya Chief Public Prosecutor’s Office.

The suspects revealed in their testimonies the links between 15 culprits and the terror group, Konya police said.

Since December 2013, when the terrorist group emerged as the perpetrator of two coup attempts disguised as graft probes, FETÖ has been regarded as a security threat. Prosecutors say that the group’s infiltrators in law enforcement, the judiciary, bureaucracy and the military had waged a long-running campaign to topple the government.

The group is also implicated in a string of cases related to its alleged plots to imprison its critics, money laundering, fraud and forgery.

FETÖ has been under more intense scrutiny since the July 15, 2016 coup attempt its infiltrators in the army carried out, which left 251 people dead and thousands more injured. Under a state of emergency issued following the attempt, tens of thousands of people were detained, arrested, or dismissed from public sector jobs.

The terrorist group faces operations almost daily as investigators still try to uncover their massive network of infiltrators everywhere. In 2024 alone, police apprehended hundreds of FETÖ suspects across the country, including fugitives on western borders trying to flee to Europe.

In late March, police detained some 70 FETÖ suspects or fugitives directly involved with the group in nationwide operations.

The National Defense Ministry announced in 2022 that 24,387 Turkish Armed Forces (TSK) members were sacked since the coup attempt for possible ties to the group, while administrative inquiries are underway for over 700 others.

Meanwhile, an unknown number of FETÖ members, mostly high-ranking figures, fled Türkiye when the coup attempt was thwarted.

Many of the group’s members had already left the country before the coup attempt after Turkish prosecutors launched investigations into other crimes of the terrorist group.