Two suspected ISIS members held in Turkey over New Year attack plot

Turkish police have detained two people in Ankara suspected of plotting a New Year suicide attack, say reports. The two men - believed to be members of Islamic State (ISIS) - had entered Turkey from Syria and were thought to have been preparing an attack on Kizilay square in the centre of the city, where crowds usually gather to celebrate the New Year. Counter-terror police arrested the pair in the Mamak district in the outskirts of the capital, the private NTV television reported.

They are suspected of being affiliated with the Islamic State and were planning an attack on the New Year in Ankara.

A Turkish official

Turkey is on high security alert after 103 people were killed on 10 October when two suicide bombers ripped through a crowd of peace activists in Ankara, the worst attack in modern Turkey’s history. That attack was blamed on IS jihadis, as were two other deadly strikes in the country’s Kurdish-dominated south-east earlier in the summer. Over the past months Turkish authorities have cracked down on the group’s so-called “sleeper cells” throughout the country.

Turkey is a target of terror because it is on the frontline in the fight against IS.

A Turkish official

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