Another senior security official told the news agency that the device used for the wedding bombing was the same type used in 2015 blasts at a pro-Kurdish rally in capital Ankara and suicide attack in the border town of Suruc.
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The attack comes with Turkey still shaken just a month after the government survived an attempted coup by rogue military officers, which Ankara blames on US-based Islamist preacher Fethullah Gulen.
The attack came after the Syria Democratic Forces, a coalition led by the main Kurdish militia groups in Syria, captured the former IS stronghold of Manbij in northern Syria under the cover of airstrikes by the USA -led coalition.
Yet the Prime Minister Binali Yildirim of Turkey says the identity of the bomber – initially regarded as a kid – hasn’t yet been confirmed. It was the deadliest in a string of blasts across Turkey this year.
Saturday’s attack in the southeastern city of Gaziantep is the deadliest in Turkey this year.
The so-called Islamic State has not claimed responsibility for the bombing, although its propaganda has previously claimed the existence of “covert units” in Turkey.
The suicide bomber himself was a child aged 12-14, President Recep Tayyip Erdogan has said.
Gaziantep is about 95 kilometers (60 miles) north of the war-torn Syrian city of Aleppo.
Hurriyet said the type of bomb used – stuffed with 2-3 centimetre shards of iron and detonated with C-4 explosives – was similar to that used in previous suicide bombings against pro-Kurdish gatherings blamed on IS in the border town of Suruc and at Ankara train station a year ago. The bride and groom are said to be among the injured.
The attack comes with Turkey still shaken just a month after the government survived an attempted coup by rogue military officers, which Ankara blames on USA -based Islamist preacher Fethullah Gulen. The boy, who was apparently targeting another Shiite mosque, tearfully claimed he was kidnapped and forced to become a suicide bomber by ISIS fanatics.
Fragments of a suicide vest were recovered by police from the scene of the attack, which took place on a crowded street where the wedding celebration was held.
Foreign Minister Mevlut Cavusoglu told reporters Monday that Turkey would press ahead with its fight against the Islamic State group inside Turkey and support efforts to remove IS fighters from its borders.
The statement criticized Erdogan’s ruling Justice and Development Party for failing to prevent such attacks and said its “hate speech, discriminating and dividing attitude in democratic political arenas furnishes the conditions” for such acts.
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In the latest southeast violence, two Turkish security force members and five PKK militants were killed in clashes and attacks in three areas of eastern Turkey over the last 24 hours, officials said.
