By Daren Butler Reuters
Turkish air strikes in north Iraq late on Sunday “neutralised” many Kurdish militants and destroyed their depots and shelters, Turkey’s defence ministry mentioned, hours after a Kurdish group claimed accountability for a bomb assault in Ankara.
Two attackers detonated a bomb close to authorities buildings in Turkey’s capital on Sunday morning. Each attackers have been killed and two cops have been wounded.
The outlawed Kurdistan Employees Social gathering (PKK) militant group claimed accountability for the assault.
“A complete of 20 targets have been destroyed, consisting of caves, bunkers, shelters and depots utilized by the separatist terrorist organisation,” the ministry mentioned, including that many militants have been “neutralised”, a time period used to imply killed.
The operations have been carried out within the Metina, Hakurk, Qandil and Gara areas of northern Iraq at 9 p.m. (1800 GMT) and that each measure was taken to keep away from hurt to civilians and the atmosphere, the ministry mentioned.
Earlier on Sunday, CCTV footage obtained by Reuters confirmed a automobile pulling as much as the Inside Ministry’s important gate and one among its occupants rapidly strolling towards the constructing earlier than being engulfed in an explosion. The opposite stayed on the road.
The bomb killed one attacker and authorities killed the opposite, the inside minister mentioned. The blast rattled a district that’s residence to ministerial buildings and the close by parliament in what was the primary assault within the capital in years, coinciding with the opening of the brand new parliamentary session.
The ANF Information web site, which is near the PKK, cited the group as saying in an announcement {that a} staff from its Immortals Battalion unit had carried out the assault.
The PKK is designated as a terrorist organisation by Turkey, america and the European Union. It launched an insurgency in southeast Turkey in 1984 and greater than 40,000 individuals have been killed within the battle.
The bomb on Ataturk Boulevard was the first in Ankara since 2016, when a spate of lethal assaults gripped the nation.
Video afterwards confirmed a Renault cargo automobile parked on the scene with home windows shattered and doorways open, amid particles and surrounded by troopers, ambulances, hearth vans and armoured automobiles.
A senior Turkish official informed Reuters the attackers had hijacked the automobile and killed its driver in Kayseri, a metropolis 260 km (161 miles) southeast of Ankara, earlier than finishing up the assault.
Throughout a sequence of bloody incidents in 2015 and 2016, Kurdish militants, Islamic State and different teams both claimed or have been blamed for a sequence of assaults in Turkish cities.
