Turkish police have detained hundreds of suspected ISIL members in nationwide raids, according to state media, in the biggest roundup to target the armed group in Turkey.
More than 400 suspects, most of them foreign nationals, were arrested during operations conducted in at least 18 provinces, Anadolu news agency reported on Sunday.
At least 60 people were detained in the capital, Ankara, while 150 were arrested in Sanliurfa in the southeast and a further 47 in the nearby city of Gaziantep close to the Syrian border.
In the Aegean province of Izmir, security forces also held at least nine suspected ISIL members who were allegedly preparing for an attack.
Another 18 people were detained in Istanbul and the neighbouring province of Kocaeli on suspicion of planning attacks. Fourteen foreigners, including 10 children, were due to be deported.
"It seems to be the biggest operation coordinated nationwide on people suspected of having ties with ISIL, which makes it clear that Turkey is clamping down on these fighters," Al Jazeera's Stephanie Dekker, reporting from Gaziantep, stated.
The Turkish government holds ISIL, which stands for Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant, and is also known as ISIS, responsible for several attacks in Turkey.
Most recently, ISIL claimed responsibility for a New Year's Eve attack on the Reina nightclub in Istanbul in which 39 people were killed.
Police detained the suspected attacker, Abdulgadir Masharipov, an Uzbek national, on January 16 and authorities say he has confessed to the massacre.
Turkish troops are also engaged in battles against ISIL fighters in the Syrian town of al-Bab, in the fiercest fighting yet of Ankara's military's campaign inside Syria that started in August.
At least 48 Turkish soldiers have been killed in the incursion so far, according to an AFP news agency tally.
Aljazeera