An explosion at a wedding hall in southeastern Turkey killed 22 people and injured 94 others Saturday night, according to a senior Turkish official who was not named due to government protocol.
Advertisement
Police say the PKK was responsible for three attacks in Turkey earlier this week that killed several people and wounded more than 200.
The explosion appeared to have been caused by a suicide bomber. It said the number of wounded remained at 94.
Deputy Prime Minister Mehmet Simsek said the attack was “barbaric”.
North Atlantic Treaty Organisation member Turkey has suffered a string of attacks by Islamic State and by Kurdish militants seeking autonomy or independence.
Erdogan used a chance to reiterate that “there is no difference between Daesh [Islamic State], the likely perpetrator of the Gaziantep attack”, the Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK) and the suspected mastermind of the failed military coup Muslim cleric Fethullah Gulen. The decision to invoke extra security measures followed a recent Islamic State (IS, formerly ISIS/ISIL) rocket attack that came from the Syrian side of the border, striking a Turkish town called Karkamış in Gaziantep Province. A suicide bomber killed two policemen there in May.
Turkey has been hit by a series of bombs both by IS and Kurdish militants in the past year, with the last IS attack on Istanbul airport in June, killing more than 40 people.
“The explosion took place during a wedding”, the official said.
The attacks have escalated as the Turkish government, which previously viewed the Syrian government of President Bashar Assad as a bigger threat, has cooperated more with the United States and the West to fight ISIS.
Advertisement
Mehmet Tascioglu, a local journalist, told NTV television, that the huge explosion could be heard in many parts of the city. “We. are united against all terror organizations”. The AP reported that the police in the city of Gaziantep sealed off the site of the attack with forensic teams moving in to collect evidence. “But God willing, we will overcome”. Hundreds of residents gathered near the site chanting “Allah is great” as well as slogans denouncing attacks.
