Turkey blast kills 30, hurts 94 at wedding
ANKARA, Turkey — A bomb attack targeting an outdoor wedding party in southeastern Turkey on Saturday killed at least 30 people and wounded 94 others, authorities said.
Deputy Prime Minister Mehmet Simsek said the 10:50 p.m. attack in the Sahinbey district of Gaziantep, near the border with Syria, appeared to be a suicide bombing. Other officials said it could have been the carried out by either Kurdish militants or Islamic State group extremists.
The Gaziantep governor’s office early Sunday raised the death toll from 22 to 30. It said the number of wounded remained at 94.
Turkey has been rocked by a wave of attacks in the past year that have either been claimed by Kurdish militants linked to the outlawed Kurdistan Workers’ Party — known by its acronym PKK — or were blamed on ISIS. In June, suspected ISIS militants attacked Istanbul’s main airport with guns and bombs, killing 44 people.
The attack comes as the country is still reeling from last month’s failed coup attempt, which the government has blamed on U.S.-based Muslim cleric Fethullah Gulen and his followers.
This past week, a string of bombings blamed on the PKK that targeted police and soldiers, killed at least a dozen people. A fragile peace process between the PKK and the government collapsed last year, leading to a resumption of the three-decade long conflict.
Mehmet Tascioglu, a local journalist, told NTV television, that the huge explosion could be heard in many parts of the city.
In Gaziantep, police sealed off the site of the explosion and forensic teams moved in. Hundreds of residents gathered near the site chanting “Allah is great” as well as slogans denouncing terrorist attacks.