Turkey: Syrian man behind deadly Ankara car bomb attack
Turkey accuses a Syrian Kurd of bombing Ankara and vows to retaliate
(35 minutes later)
ANKARA, Turkey — A Syrian national with links to Syrian Kurdish militia carried out the suicide bombing in Ankara that targeted military personnel and killed at least 28 people and wounded dozens of others, Turkey’s prime minister said Thursday, and vowed to retaliate against these groups.
ISTANBUL — Turkey Thursday accused Kurdish groups of responsibility for a suicide bombing that killed 28 people in the capital, Ankara, yesterday, 27 of them members of the Turkish military.
Ahmet Davutoglu told reporters during a visit to Turkey’s chief of military staff that the Syrian man he identified as Sahih Neccar, had carried out the attack in cooperation with Turkey’s own outlawed Kurdish rebel group.
In a televised speech, Turkish Prime Minister Ahmet Davutoglu said that a member of the Syrian People’s Protection Units, or YPG, had carried out the attack in collaboration with Turkey’s Kurdistan Workers’ Party, or PKK.
Authorities had detained nine people in connection with the attacks and were trying to identify others. Turkey’s military, meanwhile, said its jets conducted cross-border raids against Kurdish rebel positions in northern Iraq, hours after the Ankara attack, striking at a group of about 60-70 rebels of the Kurdistan Workers’ Party, or PKK.
A Syrian national identified as Saleh Najjar from the Kurdish town of Amuda in northern Syria was identified as the perpetrator of the suicide bombing, and nine people have been detained in connection with the attack, Davutoglu said.
“It has been determined with certainty that this attack was carried out by members of the separatist terror organization together with a member of the YPG who infiltrated from Syria,” Davutoglu said, referring to the Kurdistan Workers’ Party, known as the PKK, as well as the Syrian Kurdish militia group, the People’s Protection Units.
“A direct link between the attack and the YPG has been established,” Davutoglu said. “The attack was carried out by the PKK together with a person who sneaked into Turkey from Syria.”
There was no immediate claim of responsibility for the attack, which killed military personnel and civilians, although suspicion had immediately fallen on the PKK or the Islamic State group.
The bombing coincided with the launch by Turkey of artillery strikes into Syria to prevent Syrian Kurds advancing into a strategic corridor of territory near the Turkish border.
The leader of the main Syrian Kurdish group, Salih Muslim, denied that his group was behind the Ankara attack and warned Turkey against taking Syria ground action.
It raised the specter of an escalation in the cross-border fighting.
The car bomb went off late Wednesday in Turkey’s capital during evening rush hour. It exploded near buses carrying military personnel that had stopped at traffic lights, in an area close to parliament and armed forces headquarters and lodgings. The blast was the second deadly bombing in Ankara in four months.
Turkey’s president Recep Tayyep Erdogan vowed in a statement following the attack that Turkey would retaliate against the “pawns that carry out such attacks … and the forces behind them.”
Davutoglu said Syria’s government, which he accused of backing Syrian Kurdish militias, is also to blame. And in an apparent reference to the U.S., he called on Turkey’s allies to stop its support for the Syrian Kurdish group.
Davutoglu said he also held embattled Syrian President Bashar al-Assad responsible because Assad and his government have acknowledged on a number of occasions that they provide arms to the YPG.
Turkey regards the Syrian Democratic Union Party, and its military wing, the People’s Protection Units, as terrorists because of their affiliation to Turkey’s outlawed Kurdish rebel group. The Kurdish militia, however, has been fighting the Islamic State group, alongside the United States.
The charges against Syrian Kurds will also further complicate Turkey’s fraught relationship with the United States, which has partnered with the YPG in the fight against the Islamic State in Syria and has refused Turkish entreaties to abandon the alliance.
“Those who directly or indirectly back an organization that is the enemy of Turkey, risk losing the title of being a friend of Turkey,” Davutoglu said, in an apparent reference to Washington. “It is out of the question for us to excuse a terror organization that threatens the capital of our country.”
“It is out of the question for us to excuse tolerance toward a terrorist organization that targets our people in our capital,” Davutoğlu said, in an apparent reference toward tensions with Washington.
On Thursday, six soldiers were killed in southeastern Turkey after PKK rebels detonated a bomb on a road linking the cities of Diyarbakir and Bingol as their military vehicle was passing by, the state-run Anadolu Agency reported.
There has been no claim of responsibility for Wednesday’s attack, which struck a bus full of members of Turkey’s military as it paused at a traffic light in a central Ankara neighborhood that houses the nation’s parliament and government headquarters, according to Turkey’s official Anadolu News Agency. In addition to the deaths, at least 61 people were injured in the fireball that engulfed the bus and ignited trees in a nearby park at the height of the evening rush hour.
The military said Thursday that Turkish jets attacked PKK positions in northern Iraq’s Haftanin region, hitting the group of rebels which it said included a number of senior PKK leaders. The claim couldn’t be verified.
Saleh Muslim, the leader of the People’s Democratic Union, or PYD, which is the political wing of the YPG, denied to the Associated Press from his base in Europe that his group was responsible, however.
Turkey’s air force has been striking PKK positions in northern Iraq since a fragile two-and-a-half year-old peace process with the group collapsed in July, reigniting a fierce three-decade old conflict.
Cemil Bayik, one of the top leaders of the PKK who lives in northern Iraq, said he didn’t know who had carried out the bombing, but speculated that it may have been “an act of retaliation for the massacres in Kurdistan” – a reference to a brutal military campaign being waged by Turkey’s military against Kurds in southeastern Turkey.
Earlier, Yeni Safak, a newspaper close to the government, said the bomber had registered as a refugee in Turkey and Turkish authorities were able to identify him from his fingerprints.
The PKK has in the past frequently targeted military convoys and off-duty military personnel and the attacks have intensified as the Turkish military has stepped up its campaign. A bombing against a military vehicle on Thursday in southeastern Diyarbakir killed six people, the Turkish military said.
In October, suicide bombings blamed on IS targeted a peace rally outside the main train station in Ankara, killing 102 people in Turkey’s deadliest attack in years.
Turkish warplanes carried out fresh raids overnight against PKK bases in northern Iraq, a frequent retaliatory target of Turkish airstrikes.
The attack drew international condemnation and Turkish leaders have vowed to find those responsible and to retaliate against them with force.
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“Our determination to retaliate to attacks that aim against our unity, togetherness and future grows stronger with every action,” President Recep Tayyip Erdogan said Wednesday. “It must be known that Turkey will not refrain from using its right to self-defense at all times.”
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The attack came at a tense time when the Turkish government is facing an array of challenges. Hundreds of people have been killed in renewed fighting following the collapse of the peace process and tens of thousands have been displaced.
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Turkey has also been helping efforts led by the U.S. to combat the Islamic State group in neighboring Syria, and has faced several deadly bombings in the last year that were blamed on IS.
Today’s coverage from Post correspondents around the world
The Syrian war is raging along Turkey’s southern border. Recent airstrikes by Russian and Syrian forces have prompted tens of thousands of Syrian refugees to flee to Turkey’s border.
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