US Consulate in Istanbul attacked as violence flares

Hours earlier a bomb attack at a police station injured three policemen and seven civilians and caused a fire that collapsed part of the three-story building.

A Turkish special forces police officer reacts in the Sultanbeyli district in Istanbul. Istanbul shaken by twin attacks on the US consulate and a police station. Ozan Kose / AFP Photo

ISTANBUL // Turkey was hit by a series of attacks on Monday, with six members of the security forces killed and two women opening fire on the US consulate in Istanbul.

The authorities blamed the violence on Kurdish and Marxist radicals, as Ankara presses a two-pronged “antiterror” offensive against ISIL and Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK) militants.

The attacks came as Turkish prime minister Ahmet Davutoglu met Kemal Kilicdaroglu, the leader of the country’s pro-secular party, to gauge whether they have enough common ground to press ahead with efforts to form a coalition government. Turkey has until August 23 to form a new government before new elections have to be called.

Mr Davutoglu’s ruling Justice and Development Party (AKP) lost its parliamentary majority in elections in June, forcing it to seek a coalition partner.

The two party leaders met to address issues where no consensus had been reached.

President Recep Tayyip Erdogan is reported to favour new elections in the fall that could return the ruling party, which he founded, to power without the need for a coalition partner. Turkish pollster MAK found in its latest survey the AKP, has gained support in the last two months and could recover the absolute majority, if a snap parliamentary election were held immediately. The poll suggested that rising violence between government forces and Kurdish militants was bolstering support for the AKP.

The AKP would secure 44.7 per cent of the vote if a snap election were held immediately, MAK found, almost 4 percentage points more than the 40.9 per cent it gained in June, its worst result for more than a decade.

Monday’s attacks raised new concerns about security throughout Turkey in an escalating cycle of violence that has left a 2013 ceasefire agreed to by the PKK in tatters.

Four Turkish police officers were killed in a roadside bomb attack, blamed on Kurdish militants, in the southeastern Silopi district of Sirnak province bordering Iraq and Syria, the official Anatolia news agency said.

A Turkish soldier was killed in a separate incident when Kurdish militants attacked a military helicopter with rocket launchers in Sirnak’s Beytussebap district, the army said.

In Istanbul, a suspected suicide bomber detonated a vehicle packed with explosives at a police station in the Sultanbeyli district just after midnight, wounding 10 people, three of them police, the governor’s office said. One of the police later died.

Meanwhile, two women launched a gun attack against the well-fortified US consulate on the outskirts of Istanbul.

One of the two attackers was later arrested after being wounded in clashes with police.

The outlawed Marxist Revolutionary People’s Liberation Party-Front (DHKP-C) said one of its militants – named as Hatice Asik – had carried out the attack.

The DHKP-C has carried out a string of attacks in Turkey in the past, claiming a 2013 suicide attack on the US embassy in Ankara.

The authorities have targeted suspected DHKP-C, ISIL and PKK members in a succession of “antiterror” raids in the last two weeks.

A consulate spokesperson confirmed that there had been a “security incident” near the mission and the building remained closed to the public until further notice.

A Turkish official in Ankara said that the US consulate attack was linked to the DHKP-C and the Istanbul police station bombing by the PKK.

But the Istanbul police attack was also claimed by a smaller leftist group, the People’s Defence Units (HSB), on its Twitter feed.

An EU foreign affairs spokesperson condemned Monday’s “terrorist attacks”, adding that the “recent escalation of violence in the country is of serious concern and must not continue.”

The state-run Anatolia news agency said over the weekend that so far 390 “terrorists” have been killed in the air campaign in Turkey and northern Iraq with 400 wounded.

The PKK’s insurgency for greater rights and powers for Turkey’s Kurdish minority began more than 30 years ago and has left tens of thousands dead.

The PKK is designated as a terrorist organisation by Turkey, the EU and the US but Ankara’s Western allies have urged it to show restraint in the onslaught.

Senior PKK figure Cemil Bayik told the BBC in an interview on Monday that Turkey was trying to protect ISIL by fighting the PKK, who are opposed to the militants.

“They are doing it to limit the PKK’s fight against IS. Turkey is protecting IS,” he said.

Twenty-eight members of the security forces have been killed in violence linked to the PKK since the current crisis began.

The government has also vowed to begin strikes against ISIL in Syria alongside US forces who have now started arriving to use the well-located Incirlik airbase in southern Turkey.

Washington has long been pushing its ally Turkey to step up the fight against ISIL, which Ankara had been reluctant to do.

But Turkish officials have vowed that a wider fight against ISIL will start in the coming days.

* Agence France-Presse, Associated Press, Reuters