Turkish jets late on Sunday launched air strikes inside Iraqi Kurdistan, after a blast earlier the same day injured two police officers near the parliament building in Ankara.
In the hours following the bombing, Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan had already vowed that “terrorists” would never achieve their aims.
The Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK), listed as a terror group by Turkey and its Western allies, claimed responsibility for the blast. It has waged a deadly insurgency against Ankara for four decades.
Photo: AFP
The district targeted in the bombing is home to several other ministries and the Turkish parliament, which reopened as planned in the afternoon with an address from Erdogan.
“The villains who threaten the peace and security of citizens have not achieved their objectives and will never achieve them,” Erdogan said.
The Turkish Ministry of the Interior said that two attackers had arrived in a commercial vehicle at about 9:30am in front of “the entrance gate of the General Directorate of Security of our Ministry of the Interior, and carried out a bomb attack.”
“One of the terrorists blew himself up,” Turkish Minister of the Interior Ali Yerlikaya told journalists outside the ministry. “The other was killed by a bullet to the head before he had a chance to blow himself up.”
Two police officers were lightly injured in the exchange of fire, but their lives were not in danger, he added.
The Ankara prosecutors’ office said it had opened an investigation and banned access to the area. Local media were asked to stop broadcasting images from the scene of the attack.
In a statement to the Firat News Agency (ANF) news agency, which is close to the Kurdish movement, the PKK said that “a sacrificial action was carried out against the Turkish Interior Ministry.”
On Sunday evening, an official in Iraqi Kurdistan reported Turkish army planes bombing parts of the Bradost region and the village of Badran.
The Turkish Ministry of National Defense said there had been an “air operation” in northern Iraq to “neutralise the PKK.”
“A total of 20 targets were destroyed, consisting of caves, bunkers, shelters and depots used by the separatist terrorist organization,” the ministry said, adding that many militants were “neutralized,” a term used to mean killed.
The operations were conducted in the Metina, Hakurk, Qandil and Gara regions of northern Iraq at 9pm, and every measure was taken to avoid harm to civilians and the environment, it said.
In his opening remarks, Erdogan also slammed the EU for stalling his country’s membership bid, saying that Turkey “no longer expects anything from the European Union, which has kept us waiting at its door for 40 years.”
“We have kept all the promises we have made to the EU but they have kept almost none of theirs,” he said, adding that he would not “tolerate any new demands or conditions” for his country to join the bloc.
This session of Turkey’s parliament must also validate Sweden’s entry into the NATO alliance.
Hungary and Turkey in July lifted their vetoes against Sweden’s entry into the Atlantic alliance, but have been slow to ratify its membership.
Erdogan said in July that ratification by the Turkish parliament would not take place before this month, but it is expected to be approved during this parliamentary year.
For months, Erdogan has been putting pressure on Sweden to take action against desecrations of the Koran that have strained relations between the two countries.
Swedish Prime Minister Ulf Kristersson was quick to pledge in a statement after the attack that his country “once again confirms its commitment to long-term cooperation with Turkey in the fight against terrorism.”
Numerous foreign leaders also voiced support for Turkey, with messages of support coming from Germany, the UK and the US embassy in Ankara.
Additional reporting by Reuters
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