Turkey considers the YPG an off-shoot of the Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK), which is fighting Turkish security forces in the country’s Kurdish areas.
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Turkey blamed the attack on the PKK – a Kurdish separatist group that Turkey, the United States and the European Union have designated as a terror organization.
Kurdish rebels, the Islamic State group and a leftist extremist group have carried out attacks in the country recently.
The attacks will increase tensions between Turkey and its allies over their relationship with Kurdish forces in Syria as Ankara wages parallel campaigns against ISIS and PKK rebels.
“Even though those who head the PYD and PKK say this has no connection with them, based on the information obtained by our interior minister and our intelligence agencies, it is identified that this is done by them”, said Erdogan.
The massive auto bomb struck five buses carrying military service personnel when it stopped at a red traffic light in the centre of the capital on Wednesday evening.
“These accusations are clearly related to Turkish attempts to intervene in Syria”, he added.
Davutoglu earlier blamed the YPG for a January bombing in Istanbul that was later ascribed to the Islamic State group.
Ahmet Davutoglu also told reporters Thursday that Syria’s government, which he accused of backing Syrian Kurdish militias, is also to blame.
In an apparent reference to the U.S., Davutoglu called on allies to stop its support for the Syrian Kurdish group.
Erdogan, Turkey’s president, said Wednesday’s attack demonstrated that there are strong links between the PKK and Syrian Kurd fighters.
“We recognize that the Turks do [label the PYD as terrorists], and I understand that”. The U.S. already lists the PKK as a terror group.
“Those who directly or indirectly back an organisation that is the enemy of Turkey risk losing the title of being a friend of Turkey”, he said.
“It will be interesting to see how the United States reacts because they view the YPG as an ally”, said Paul Levin, the director of Stockholm University’s Turkish Studies institute. The PKK was also reported to be responsible for a Thursday bombing in southeastern Turkey that killed six soldiers, according to Anadolu Agency. The claim could not be verified.
Over the past month, Turkish forces have repeatedly attacked YPG positions in Syria, claiming the Kurdish militia is a terrorist group that threatens Turkish security.
In October, over 100 people were killed in a double suicide bombing that targeted a peace march in the Turkish capital.
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”. “There are more than one million Syrians in Turkey”, he said. “Turkey will not shy away from using its right to self-defence at any time, any place or any occasion”, Erdogan warned.
Wednesday’s attack comes at a tense time when the Turkish government is facing an array of challenges.
Turkey lately has also directed its ire at Russian Federation after Moscow began supporting the Syrian government with airstrikes. The group’s supply lines across the Turkish-Syrian border would be threatened if the YPG manages to establish contiguous territory along the frontier.
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Turkey is concerned that the YPG is trying to create an autonomous region in northern Syria on its southern border.
