The death toll in bomb blasts in Istanbul rose to 17 on Monday, Turkish broadcaster NTV said, and more than 150 people were wounded in an attack hours ahead of a court case over banning the governing party.
NTV said the toll reached 17 after one person died from wounds sustained in the Sunday evening blasts in a working class neighbourhood on the European side of Istanbul. More than a dozen people were seriously injured in the two explosions.
Prime Minister Tayyip Erdogan cancelled his weekly Cabinet meeting to travel to Turkey’s largest city to visit the site of the blasts, a government official told Reuters.
The site was still cordoned off early on Monday and police were not allowing people into the area other than shop owners, as forensic teams examined the scene and police investigated security cameras in the largely residential area.
”We know the killers,” Sabah newspaper said in a headline above a picture of bodies strewn across a busy pedestrian area where two bombs had torn through the crowds.
No one has claimed responsibility for the attacks, the deadliest in Turkey since 2003. Newspapers said three people had been detained in connection with the bombings.
Kurdish separatists, far-left groups and Islamist militants have all carried out bombings in Istanbul in the past.
Several newspapers said police were focusing their investigations this time on the outlawed separatist Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK), saying it has used similar explosives.
The PKK, considered a terrorist organisation by the United States, Turkey and the European Union, has waged a deadly campaign for a Kurdish homeland in south-east Turkey since 1984. The PKK usually does not target civilians.
Officials said an initial loud blast on Sunday evening brought people into the streets and a larger bomb hidden in a rubbish bin exploded 10 minutes later and 50m away in the Gungoren district, near Istanbul’s main international airport, where families gather in the evenings to dine and stroll.
Uncertainty
Turkish financial markets weakened slightly on the news as well on concerns over the court case against the AK Party.
Turkey, which is seeking European Union membership, has been plunged into political and economic uncertainty by a court case over banning the ruling party.
The Constitutional Court, Turkey’s highest judicial body, began deliberating on Monday on whether the AK Party has engaged in Islamist activities and should be closed. The party denies the charges. A ruling is expected in early August.
The court case is linked to a power struggle between Turkey’s secularist establishment and the Islamist-rooted AK Party, which are at odds over the direction of the officially secular but predominantly Muslim country.
Tensions have also risen in recent weeks over a widening police investigation into a suspected ultra-nationalist group accused of seeking to overthrow the government.
Two senior retired generals have also been arrested in the probe, which has rattled Turkey.
The Istanbul attacks came hours after Turkish fighter jets bombed suspected PKK targets across the border in northern Iraq, used by guerrillas as a base from which to carry out strikes on Turkish territory. – Reuters