• Nine security personnel wounded in standoff near Sea of Marmara
• Pre-dawn raids hit more than 100 locations across 15 provinces

ANKARA: Three Turk­ish police officers and six militants from the militant Islamic State group were killed in a gunfight in northwest Turkiye on Monday, the interior minister said, as nationwide raids on more than 100 addresses left nine others wounded.

“The fighting occurred in Yalova, on the Sea of Ma­r­mara, during one of scores of simultaneous rai­ds across the country. Thr­ee of our courageous police unfortunately lost their lives. Eight police and a security agent were also wounded,” Interior Mini­ster Ali Yerlikaya said.

Authorities launched the pre-dawn operations targeting 108 addresses in 15 provinces. When police raided the house in Yalova on the suspicion that militants were hiding there, the suspects resisted.

“During this operation, IS terrorists opened fire on our courageous police,” Mr Yerlikaya said.

Sporadic gunfire was hea­rd during the standoff, which lasted nearly eight hours, according to a photographer at the scene. Pol­ice had sealed off the road approaching the house, and smoke was visible rising from the area as a pol­i­ce helicopter flew overhead.

The minister said the six slain operatives were all Turkish citizens. Five women and six children who were inside the property were evacuated safely.

Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan paid homage to the officers in a post on social media platform X, vowing that the country’s battle against the group would continue.

“We are pursuing our fight against bloodthirsty criminals who threaten the peace of our nation and the security of our state, both inside and outside our borders, in a determined, multi-pronged and intractable fashion,” he said.

Monday’s operation followed a wave of preventive measures. Last week, an Istanbul prosecutor orde­red the detention of suspected IS members following intelligence that the group planned attacks against non-Muslims during Christmas and New Year celebrations.

Police have arrested more than 130 suspects in the last month.

Turkiye shares a 900-kilometre border with Syria and has stepped up operations against the group amid concerns of cross-frontier infiltrations.

Turkish intelligence announced last week the arrest “between Afghan­istan and Pakistan,” of a suspected IS leader allegedly planning suicide atta­cks in the region and Eur­ope. The militant Islamic State group was also recently ac­c­used of killing two Ame­r­ican soldiers and an interpreter in Palmyra, Syria.

Almost a decade ago, the IS group was blamed for a series of assaults on civilian targets in Turkiye during a wave of violence between 2015 and 2017, including gun attacks on an Istanbul nightclub and the city’s main airport that killed dozens of people.

Published in Dawn, December 30th, 2025