authorities have detained 1,065 suspects and arrested 28 of them after riots across Türkiye over the alleged sexual abuse of a child by a Syrian man in the central city of Kayseri.
Properties and vehicles owned by Syrians were vandalized and set on fire in Kayseri last Sunday, stoked by social media reports that a Syrian man had sexually abused a female child relative.
The violence spread to the provinces of Hatay, Gaziantep, Konya, Bursa and an Istanbul district, Türkiye’s National Intelligence Organization (MIT) said in a statement. There were social media reports of some injuries among Syrians.
Yerlikaya said 855 people were detained involved in attacks targeting the Syrian community in Kayseri and 13 of these were arrested while 145 were released under judicial control.
“Some 468 of these detainees had criminal records on 50 different accounts, including migrants smuggling, intentional injuries, theft, looting, sexual abuse and blackmail,” Yerlikaya told reporters at a press briefing in Kayseri.
He said most suspects detained across Türkiye were still in processing.
“There is a provocative trend on especially social media platforms about migrants,” the minister said. “Bot accounts are sharing manipulative, negative and untrue posts.”
Pointing out that the rate of such bot accounts was over 68%, the highest he’s seen since taking over the ministry in June last year, Yerlikaya said the cybercrime department found 189 users, six of whom based abroad, who were spreading disinformation so far.
