Turkey kills Daesh suspect, detains 4 more

ISTANBUL: Turkish security forces on Saturday killed one suspected Daesh member and detained four more said to have been planning a bomb attack in the country, local authorities said.

Turkish forces in the southern Hatay region bordering Syria stopped a vehicle carrying five suspected Daesh members after receiving intelligence “they had come to our country to carry out a bomb attack,” the regional governor’s office said.

It said that four of the suspects gave themselves up but security forces opened fire on the fifth individual after he failed to heed warnings to surrender and attempted to attack them.

Identified as a Syrian national, he later died in hospital despite efforts to save his life, the statement said.

The statement said intense investigations were continuing into the incident but did not say if any explosives were found in the vehicle.

Turkey was hit by a succession of attacks in 2016 that left hundreds dead in the bloodiest year of terror strikes in its history.

The attacks were attributed to Daesh terrorists as well as the outlawed Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK) who have battled the Turkish state in an insurgency lasting more than three decades.

In one of the bloodiest strikes, a Daesh gunman opened fire on an elite nightclub in Istanbul just 75 minutes into New Year’s Day in 2017, killing 39 people, mainly foreigners.