» Ambassador assassinated:
A Turkish policeman fatally shot Russia’s ambassador to Turkey on Monday in front of a shocked audience at a photo exhibit and then, pacing near the body of his victim, appeared to condemn Russia’s military role in Syria.
Ankara, Turkey — A Turkish policeman fatally shot Russia’s ambassador to Turkey on Monday in front of a shocked audience at a photo exhibit and then, pacing near the body of his victim, appeared to condemn Russia’s military role in Syria, shouting: “Don’t forget Aleppo! Don’t forget Syria!”
The leaders of Turkey and Russia said the attack in Ankara, the Turkish capital, was an attempt to disrupt efforts to repair ties between their countries, which have backed opposing sides in the Syrian civil war.
An Associated Press photographer and others at the art gallery event watched in horror as the gunman, who was wearing a dark suit and tie, fired at least eight shots, at one point walking around Ambassador Andrei Karlov as he lay motionless and shooting him again at close range.
The assailant, who was identified as Mevlut Mert Altintas, a member of Ankara’s riot police squad, was later killed in a shootout with police. Three other people were wounded in the attack, authorities said.
The assassination came after days of protests by Turks angry over Russia’s support for President Bashar Assad in the Syrian conflict and Russia’s role in the bombardment and destruction of Aleppo, Syria’s largest city.
The gunman shouted about Aleppo in Turkish, and also yelled “Allahu akbar,” the Arabic phrase for “God is great,” continuing in Arabic: “We are the descendants of those who supported the Prophet Muhammad, for jihad.”
The attack, condemned by the White House and the United Nations, was another sign of how Turkey, a NATO member and a partner in the U.S.-led campaign against the Islamic State group, is struggling to contain multiple security threats. The war in Syria has been a major problem for years, sending several million refugees into Turkey and, more recently, drawing in Turkish troops.
Turkey has become accustomed to deadly attacks — Kurdish militants claimed responsibility for Dec. 10 bombings in Istanbul that killed 44 people, many of them police.
The spectacle of 62year-old Karlov’s assassination by a member of the Turkish security forces at a photography exhibit meant to highlight Russian culture reinforced the sense of unease over the region’s conflict and complex web of alliances and relationships.
It came a day before a key meeting about Syria to be held in Moscow. Those attending include the foreign and defense ministers from Turkey, an opponent of Assad, and Russia and Iran, backers of the Syrian regime.
Russian President Vladimir Putin described the killing of Karlov as an attempt to damage Russia-Turkey ties “and to thwart a peace process in Syria which Russia, Turkey and Iran have been actively trying to promote.”
Putin said he and Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan agreed in a phone call that Russian investigators would fly to Ankara to conduct a joint probe with their Turkish counterparts.
Karlov was several minutes into a speech at the embassy-sponsored exhibition in Ankara when he was gunned down.
Altintas, the gunman, also fired shots in the air, sending panicked audience members running for cover, and smashed several of the framed photos hung for the exhibition. The floor was splattered with blood, and the ambassador’s eye glasses lay a few feet from his body.
After shooting the ambassador, the gunman climbed to the second floor of the same building and a 15-minute shootout with police ensued before he was killed, Turkey’s Anadolu news agency reported.
Interior Minister Suleyman Soylu said Altintas, who was born in 1994, had been an officer with Ankara’s riot police squad for more than two years. He did not give a motive for the attack.