Turkey’s police and intelligence services may have ignored a wave of warnings about potential suicide bombers from the so-called Islamic State that could have prevented the deadly blasts in Ankara that killed nearly 102 people last weekend.
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The Kurds have been unhappy with how they have been treated as a minority for years by Turkish authorities. Due to its proximity to both Syria and Iraq, Turkey’s cooperation is essential to any operation against the group. A quick check of my twitter feed reported a terrorist attack at a pro-Kurdish peace rally in the heart of Turkey’s capital Ankara, a place I had once called home.
Davutoğlu said that the government and police had “made progress on the planning phase of this attack”.
The UK’s Daily Telegraph reported remarks by the father of the second alleged Ankara suicide bomber, explaining that Dundar left Turkey for Syria in 2013: “In 2014, my son came to Adiyaman and lived with me for eight months”.
Nationalist Movement Party (MHP) deputy leader Oktay Ozturk also criticised the ban, saying that it was “now natural” for the government to limit media freedom in Turkey. On Sunday, demonstrators and mourners in Ankara directly blamed the government for failing to protect the rally, accusing it of instigating chaos to secure a majority in the election.
Three top Turkish police officials were sacked on Wednesday over the weekend’s twin blasts in Ankara, as the under-fire president paid homage to those killed in the country’s bloodiest attacks.
A Kurdish insurgency, launched in 1984, has cost over 40,000 lives. The teahouse, run by Yunus Emre Alagoz, was known in the city and beyond as a recruiting place for ISIS. The Wall Street Journal notes that even though Kurdish forces are battling the Islamic State in Syria, Davutoglu has alleged a meeting between PKK representatives and ISIS to plan coordinated terrorist actions against Turkey.
But just imagine for a moment that it really had been a terrorist who committed the massacre without the knowledge of the Turkish government, and that the state institutions were completely innocent.
Turkish air strikes against Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK) bases in the southeastern province of Hakkari have killed 11 suspected militants and destroyed weapons depots and shelters, the military said on Saturday. The Kurds proclaimed peace and brotherhood, Turkey as usual, responded with murder.
“No one can guarantee that arms given to the PYD today won’t fall into the hands of the PKK tomorrow and be used against Turkey”, Turkish Prime Minister Ahmet Davutoglu said last week.
Deputy Prime Minister Numan Kurtulmus said on Friday the perpetrators of the attack have been identified “99 per cent”. “We, the politicians, are responsible of the murders committed in our country”.
The attack has raised political tensions to new highs as Turkey prepares for a snap election on November 1, with polarization within the country now greater than ever.
The Ankara bombings will continue to create chaos and widen political divides shortly before the election.
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Erdogan’s autocratic rule, including attacks on press freedom, encouraged the ballot box comeuppance he experienced, but at the heart of it all in Turkey is the ongoing conflict between ethnic Turks and Kurds. In July, he intervened in coalition talks between the AKP and the main opposition party, Republican Peoples Party (CHP), leading to their collapse.
