However, there was no immediate claim of responsibility following the explosion.
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The district houses many refugees who fled fighting in Kobane between Islamic State (IS) militants and Kurdish fighters since last September, when IS overran Suruc.
At least 27 people have been killed and 100 others wounded in a blast on Monday in Suruc, Turkey, according to the country’s Interior Ministry. The Suruc blast took place as a group from Turkish left-wing youth associations were preparing to make a press statement in Suruc to announce they would cross into Kobane.
Turkey has often boasted of an “open-door” policy championed by President Recep Tayyip Erdogan and taken in 1.8 million refugees since the Syrian conflict started in 2011 but has repeatedly complained that it has been left to shoulder an unfair burden.
Turkish broadcaster NTV said that at least 10 were killed and 20 injured in the explosion, while local Kurdish media is reporting at least 30 dead.
There is no official word on the cause of the explosion.
Monday’s attack is the deadliest since twin car-bomb explosions killed more than 50 people in Reyhanli, also near the border with Syria, in May 2013.
Interior Minister Sebahattin Ozturk told the state-run Anadolu news agency that intelligence pointed to a suicide bombing and said the attacker will “soon be identified”.
A Turkish official speaking to CNN on condition of anonymity said the government thinks the attack is “retaliation to the Turkish government’s fight against terrorism”. Hundreds of youth workers were reportedly staying there.
“Turkey condemns the perpetrators of this heinous attack that targeted the peace environment, and offers condolences to the deceased and wishes a speedy recovery to the wounded”, it said, asking for calm. It must also consider the danger of attacks in sprawling Western cities such as Istanbul where British and Jewish targets were bombed by al Qaeda in 2003 with the loss of 60 lives. Kobani, a city populated heavily by Syrian Kurds, was the Islamic State group’s biggest defeat past year since the militants established control over large swathes of Iraq and Syria.
In Kobani, a suicide bomber detonated a vehicle bomb at a checkpoint, killing two members of Kurdish security forces, according to Rami Abdel Rahman, director of the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights.
Both have criticized the government for what they say is its unwillingness to crack down on Islamic State supporters along the porous border with Syria.
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Anadolu said almost 100 people were being treated at Suruc and Sanliurfa state hospitals.
