ANKARA, Turkey (AP) — Turkish police on Tuesday detained at least 20 people allegedly involved in violent protests, as the country’s prime minister continued to lash out at protesters — and a BBC journalist — he claimed were part of a conspiracy to harm Turkey.

The state-run Anadolu Agency said police searched some 30 addresses in the capital Ankara and rounded up 20 people with alleged links to ‘‘terror’’ groups and suspected of ‘‘attacking police and the environment’’ during three weeks of protests that swept Turkey. It was the second police sweep against demonstrators in the city this week.

Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan holds unspecified foreign forces, bankers and media outlets responsible for the protests that began in Istanbul on May 31, following a heavy-handed police clampdown on peaceful activists. The protests quickly spread to other cities, with thousands expressing discontent with what critics have said is Erdogan’s increasingly authoritarian way of governing.

Erdogan, who took power a decade ago, denies he is authoritarian and, as evidence of his popularity, points to elections in 2011 that returned his party to power with 50 percent of the vote and gave him a third term in office.

The protests have largely subsided, but late on Monday, thousands in Istanbul protested a court decision that released a police officer from custody pending trial for the killing of a demonstrator in Ankara.

In an address to members of his Islamic-rooted party in Parliament, Erdogan reiterated that the protests were orchestrated by forces wanting to prevent Turkey’s rise.

He repeated his claim that the same conspiracy was at work in Brazil, saying both countries had paid off debts to the International Monetary Fund.

Mass rallies in Brazil were set off this month by a 10-cent hike in bus and subway fares in Sao Paulo, Rio de Janeiro and elsewhere.

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