October 28, 2015•Update: October 29, 2015
ANKARA
The Ankara bombing that killed 102 people was ordered by Daesh commanders in Syria, prosecutors said Wednesday.
The Ankara Chief Public Prosecutor’s office said a Daesh cell from Gaziantep, a province in southern Turkey that borders Syria, carried out the Oct. 10 bombing that was the deadliest in modern Turkish history.
In a statement, the office said the attack was organized by a "cellular configuration" group. The cell "planned to carry out nationwide attacks under the instruction of the Daesh terrorist organization in Syria," it added.
Prosecutors previously identified one of the two suicide bombers as Yunus Emre Alagoz and said he had returned to Turkey from Syria.
Tuesday’s statement said "digital material" showed how the attack aimed to sabotage the Nov.1 general election and "disrupt political stability and complicate the establishment of a government following the election."
The Oct. 10 bombing targeted leftist and pro-Kurdish peace protesters as Turkey prepared for Sunday’s general election re-run.
As well as hoping to postpone the election through "widespread terrorist acts", prosecutors noted the terrorists aimed to cause the supporters of the "target group" to take to the streets in protests, to cast blame on the government and to legitimize the attacks of the terrorist PKK group in Turkey.
The statement said only 5 percent of digital data had been deciphered. A 20-strong team is still working to decode the rest of the information.
According to prosecutors, there is strong evidence the cell was behind the May 18 attacks on the offices of the Peoples’ Democratic Party (HDP) in southern Turkey and the June 5 attack on an HDP rally in Diyarbakir that killed four.
These attacks came just before the June 7 general election in Turkey.
It was likely responsible for the Suruc suicide bombing on July 20 that killed 33 pro-Kurdish activists, the statement added. Alagoz’s brother has been identified as the bomber in an atrocity led to a renewed terrorist campaign by the PKK.
The Daesh cell also planned other attacks across Turkey and was granted permission to target any opponents of Daesh and the PKK, the prosecutor’s office said.
It had requested permission to attack Christian and Jewish targets and was planning a suicide attack on a military base.
Prosecutors also claimed the terror cell was provided with a "regular money transfer" from Syria and attempted to recruit within Turkey, identifying young Syrian refugees as particular targets.
Since the Ankara bombing there has been an apparent increase in police operations against Daesh supporters in Turkey.
On Monday, two police officers were killed in a raid on a Daesh cell in Diyarbakir that was followed by raids across three provinces in which 65 suspects were arrested.
