“Our country and our nation have again only one message to those who attack us – you will not succeed!” he said.
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The attack also comes after last month’s military coup attempt that the government blamed on USA -based Muslim cleric Fethullah Gülen and his supporters.
Turkish leaders have vowed to “completely cleanse” the country’s border areas of any IS group presence, with Erdogan accusing the Syria-based jihadist group of trying to exploit ethnic tensions in Turkey.
It comes after this weekend’s suicide bombing at a wedding in the city of Gaziantep – close to the Syrian border – killed 54 people.
In Syria, a Kurdish-led group known as the Syria Democratic Forces earlier this month liberated the nearby town of Manbij from the ISIS group, triggering concerns in Ankara that they would seize the entire border strip with Turkey. Almost half of the dead were under 14 years old.
A senior security official told Reuters the device used was the same type as those employed in the July 2015 suicide attack in the border town of Suruc and the October 2015 suicide bombing of a rally of pro-Kurdish activists in Ankara. When Turkish officials came bearing Turkish flags, the Kurdish mourners grew angry and began hurling rocks at the officials.
While Turkey regards the Turkish PKK and its Syrian allies as terrorist entities, the United States and other Western nations views the Kurds as the most effective fighters in the war against the IS group.
Witnesses said the blast, the deadliest terror attack in Turkey this year, occurred in a packed street of people dancing and celebrating the marriage.
There was no immediate claim of responsibility, but officials said it appeared to be the work of the Islamic State group. “It’s the cross-border settlement of scores by two actors fighting in Syria”.
Turkish authorities initially blamed the blast on a child bomber linked to IS, believing it was retaliation for offensives by Kurdish militias and pro-Ankara Syrian opposition forces fighting IS in Syria.
“The fundamental aim in the latest operation is to open a corridor for moderate rebels”, the official said. “Since these victims were mainly Kurdish, the PKK probably wasn’t behind it”, Peter says.
Writing in The Independent following that attack, Yasmin Ahmed said: “There seems to be limits to our solidarity and these boundaries look uncomfortably like the map of western Europe”.
“I can’t forget that moment”, she told The Associated Press, adding that she was not able to return to her house near the scene of the attack and was staying with her sister. “There is nothing to say, it was murder”.
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“My uncle’s children died”.
