Turkish antiterrorism police break a door during an operation to arrest people over alleged links to ISIL, in Adiyaman, southeastern Turkey, on Sunday, February 5, 2017. Mahir Alan / Dha-Depo Photos via AP
Turkish antiterrorism police break a door during an operation to arrest people over alleged links to ISIL, in Adiyaman, southeastern Turkey, on Sunday, February 5, 2017. Mahir Alan / Dha-Depo Photos vShow more

Turkey detains more than 400 ISIL suspects in antiterror raids



ISTANBUL // Turkish police detained more than 400 suspected members of ISIL in nationwide antiterror raids on Sunday, just over a month after an attack on an Istanbul nightclub claimed by the extremists.

The detainees were rounded up in Turkey’s biggest police operation so far against ISIL since the New Year attack which saw 39 people killed when a gunman opened fire inside the Reina nightclub.

Those detained included foreigners and those suspected of planning attacks in Turkey, the Dogan and Anadolu news agencies reported. Anadolu said according to the latest figure, 423 suspects were detained so far.

The operation around the country saw 150 suspects rounded up in Sanliurfa in the south-east and 47 in the nearby city of Gaziantep close to the Syrian border which has a known extremist presence, Dogan said.

Sixty suspects, mostly foreigners, were detained in four districts in the capital Ankara. Dozens more were arrested in provinces from Bursa in the west to Bingol in the east.

In the usually peaceful Aegean city of Izmir, nine people suspected of travelling to and from Syria and planning attacks in the city were detained, Anadolu said.

One of the suspects detained in Izmir — a Syrian identified only as EA — is said to have been in touch with people smugglers in a bid to help the ISIL members escape to Europe, Anadolu said.

Eighteen people were detained in Istanbul and the neighbouring province of Kocaeli on suspicion of planning attacks. Another 14 foreigners were due to be deported, including 10 children.

In addition to the latest arrests, Turkey says at least 780 people including 350 foreigners, remain in detention over suspected links to the extremist group. Some of them have already been convicted.

Thirty-nine people, mainly foreigners, were killed on New Year’s night when a gunman went on the rampage inside a plush Istanbul nightclub.

ISIL claimed the massacre, its first clear claim for a major attack in Turkey although it had been blamed for several bombings in 2016.

The suspected attacker, Uzbek national Abdulgadir Masharipov, was detained on January 16 after over two weeks on the run. Authorities say he has confessed to the massacre.

The Hurriyet daily reported after the attack that ISIL also planned a simultaneous New Year’s strike in Ankara but dropped the plot after arrests by the Turkish authorities.

An Istanbul court on Friday placed a dozen people under arrest ahead of trial over the nightclub plot, including Masharipov’s wife Zarina Nurullayeva.

In her statement to investigators published in Turkish media, she said that she had “no idea” what her husband was planning and “most of the accusations against me are false”.

Turkey was in 2016 shaken by a string of attacks blamed on ISIL and Kurdish militants that left hundreds dead.

It is also engaged in a battle with ISIL to take the Syrian town of Al Bab, in the fiercest fighting yet of the Turkish military’s campaign inside Syria that started in August.

At least 48 Turkish soldiers have been killed in the incursion so far, according to the AFP, the vast majority in the battle for Al-Bab since the fight for the town began in December.

Turkey was long accused by its western allies of not doing enough to stem the flow of extremists across its borders and emergence of ISIL cells in its own cities.

Ankara denies the charges, saying it has listed ISIL as a terror group since 2013. However observers say Turkey has markedly stepped up its actions against ISIL in the last months and note that the capture of Masharipov alive may provide it with valuable intelligence.

* Agence France-Presse and Reuters

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Director: Mowaffaq Alobaid 

Stars: Abdulaziz Almadhi, Mohammed Al Akkasi, Ali Al Suhaibani

Rating: 4/5

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The Sand Castle

Director: Matty Brown

Stars: Nadine Labaki, Ziad Bakri, Zain Al Rafeea, Riman Al Rafeea

Rating: 2.5/5

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The chef's advice

Troy Payne, head chef at Abu Dhabi’s newest healthy eatery Sanderson’s in Al Seef Resort & Spa, says singles need to change their mindset about how they approach the supermarket.

“They feel like they can’t buy one cucumber,” he says. “But I can walk into a shop – I feed two people at home – and I’ll walk into a shop and I buy one cucumber, I’ll buy one onion.”

Mr Payne asks for the sticker to be placed directly on each item, rather than face the temptation of filling one of the two-kilogram capacity plastic bags on offer.

The chef also advises singletons not get too hung up on “organic”, particularly high-priced varieties that have been flown in from far-flung locales. Local produce is often grown sustainably, and far cheaper, he says.

City's slump

L - Juventus, 2-0
D - C Palace, 2-2
W - N Forest, 3-0
L - Liverpool, 2-0
D - Feyenoord, 3-3
L - Tottenham, 4-0
L - Brighton, 2-1
L - Sporting, 4-1
L - Bournemouth, 2-1
L - Tottenham, 2-1

Company%20Profile
%3Cp%3E%3Cstrong%3ECompany%20name%3A%3C%2Fstrong%3E%20Hoopla%3Cbr%3E%3Cstrong%3EDate%20started%3A%20%3C%2Fstrong%3EMarch%202023%3Cbr%3E%3Cstrong%3EFounder%3A%3C%2Fstrong%3E%20Jacqueline%20Perrottet%3Cbr%3E%3Cstrong%3EBased%3A%3C%2Fstrong%3E%20Dubai%3Cbr%3E%3Cstrong%3ENumber%20of%20staff%3A%3C%2Fstrong%3E%2010%3Cbr%3E%3Cstrong%3EInvestment%20stage%3A%20%3C%2Fstrong%3EPre-seed%3Cbr%3E%3Cstrong%3EInvestment%20required%3A%3C%2Fstrong%3E%20%24500%2C000%3C%2Fp%3E%0A

Mercer, the investment consulting arm of US services company Marsh & McLennan, expects its wealth division to at least double its assets under management (AUM) in the Middle East as wealth in the region continues to grow despite economic headwinds, a company official said.

Mercer Wealth, which globally has $160 billion in AUM, plans to boost its AUM in the region to $2-$3bn in the next 2-3 years from the present $1bn, said Yasir AbuShaban, a Dubai-based principal with Mercer Wealth.

Within the next two to three years, we are looking at reaching $2 to $3 billion as a conservative estimate and we do see an opportunity to do so,” said Mr AbuShaban.

Mercer does not directly make investments, but allocates clients’ money they have discretion to, to professional asset managers. They also provide advice to clients.

“We have buying power. We can negotiate on their (client’s) behalf with asset managers to provide them lower fees than they otherwise would have to get on their own,” he added.

Mercer Wealth’s clients include sovereign wealth funds, family offices, and insurance companies among others.

From its office in Dubai, Mercer also looks after Africa, India and Turkey, where they also see opportunity for growth.

Wealth creation in Middle East and Africa (MEA) grew 8.5 per cent to $8.1 trillion last year from $7.5tn in 2015, higher than last year’s global average of 6 per cent and the second-highest growth in a region after Asia-Pacific which grew 9.9 per cent, according to consultancy Boston Consulting Group (BCG). In the region, where wealth grew just 1.9 per cent in 2015 compared with 2014, a pickup in oil prices has helped in wealth generation.

BCG is forecasting MEA wealth will rise to $12tn by 2021, growing at an annual average of 8 per cent.

Drivers of wealth generation in the region will be split evenly between new wealth creation and growth of performance of existing assets, according to BCG.

Another general trend in the region is clients’ looking for a comprehensive approach to investing, according to Mr AbuShaban.

“Institutional investors or some of the families are seeing a slowdown in the available capital they have to invest and in that sense they are looking at optimizing the way they manage their portfolios and making sure they are not investing haphazardly and different parts of their investment are working together,” said Mr AbuShaban.

Some clients also have a higher appetite for risk, given the low interest-rate environment that does not provide enough yield for some institutional investors. These clients are keen to invest in illiquid assets, such as private equity and infrastructure.

“What we have seen is a desire for higher returns in what has been a low-return environment specifically in various fixed income or bonds,” he said.

“In this environment, we have seen a de facto increase in the risk that clients are taking in things like illiquid investments, private equity investments, infrastructure and private debt, those kind of investments were higher illiquidity results in incrementally higher returns.”

The Abu Dhabi Investment Authority, one of the largest sovereign wealth funds, said in its 2016 report that has gradually increased its exposure in direct private equity and private credit transactions, mainly in Asian markets and especially in China and India. The authority’s private equity department focused on structured equities owing to “their defensive characteristics.”

Company%20profile
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Company%20Profile
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THE%20SPECS
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