Then there was a third blast: “a roadside bomb that detonated as an armored military vehicle was passing in eastern Bitlis province”, Peter says. At least 73 other people 53 civilians and 20 police officers were wounded, officials said.
Advertisement
Authorities say the assaults were carried out by the Kurdistan Workers’ Party, or PKK, which has launched a campaign of auto bombings targeting police stations or roadside bomb attacks against security force vehicles.
Turkish President Tayyip Erdogan on Thursday blamed followers of US -based cleric Fethullah Gulen for playing a role in a series of bomb attacks in eastern Turkey blamed on the Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK).
A string of bombings, blamed on Kurdish rebels and targeting Turkey’s security forces, killed at least 14 people and wounded more than 220 others, officials said Thursday.
Yildirim vowed to fight the PKK until it is “eliminated”.
Gov. Ibrahim Tasyapan of Van province said the attack, which targeted the police station in the town of Ipekyolu late Wednesday, also wounded dozens of other people.
It was the fifth explosion in the past two weeks to target police facilities in southeastern and eastern Turkey.
Clashes between the PKK and Turkey’s security forces resumed a year ago after a fragile peace process collapsed.
In a speech broadcast live on television, Erdogan said Turkey was facing joint attacks by various terrorist organizations who act together.
The government says US-based cleric Fethullah Gulen, head of a large religious movement, was behind the attempted coup, a charge he denies.
Yildirim said in his comments in Elazig that FETO – the government’s name for Gulen’s network – had “handed over its mission” to the PKK.
The PKK is a designated terrorist outfit by Turkey, the European Union and the United States of America.
Advertisement
“There is no difference between the PKK, Daesh (ISIS), and FETO”. “The PKK resumed its long-running conflict against the Turkish military in July 2015, after more than two years of reconciliation talks broke down”.
