PKK claims deadly attack in Turkish capital

Five people were killed and 22 others injured on Wednesday in the attack on the Turkish aerospace industry building in Ankara. Turkey responded by dropping bombs on PKK targets in Iraq and Syria.

Family members and relatives mourn near a coffin during the funeral of those killed in a bomb attack on the Turkish Aerospace Industry (TAI) state building, in Ankara, October 24, 2024. Adem Altan , AFP

Banned Kurdish PKK militants on Friday claimed responsibility for an attack on a Turkish defense company that left five people dead, with officials saying the perpetrators infiltrated from Syria and carried out a shooting spree and suicide attack.

The Turkish government said it had evidence that the PKK was behind Wednesday's attack on a major defense company near Ankara and hours later its warplanes bombed militant targets in Iraq and in Syria.

The attack on the state-owned Turkish Aerospace Industries (TAI) “was carried out by a team from the (PKK) Immortals Battalion,” the group said on Telegram.

He said the attack by two PKK militants, a man and a woman, had been “prepared for a long time”, denying any link with recent developments – a reference to the apparent softening of Turkish authorities in favor of a solution negotiated after decades. long conflict.

The PKK, which has waged an intermittent insurgency against the Turkish state since 1984, is designated as a terrorist group by Turkey and its Western allies.

In 2011, President Recep Tayyip Erdogan gave his blessing to several behind-the-scenes peace efforts to try to resolve the so-called Kurdish problem, but the fragile truce collapsed in 2015 in a new wave of violence.

Since then, Erdogan's AKP government and its junior partner, the far-right MHP, have maintained military pressure on the Kurdish rebels.

On Tuesday, the MHP leader sent shockwaves by offering an olive branch to imprisoned PKK leader Abdullah Öcalan, suggesting he come to parliament to renounce terrorism and dissolve his movement.

A day later, Öcalan – who has been held in solitary confinement on a Turkish prison island since 1999 – received the first visit from his family since 2020.

His nephew, Omer Ocalan, an MP for the main pro-Kurdish DEM party, confirmed the visit on X, saying the family last saw him “on March 3, 2020.”

And DEM party officials reportedly suggested that Öcalan could ask the PKK to lay down their arms, as he did in a letter in 2013.

But the visit had barely ended when the Ankara attack began.

Erdogan vowed there would be no let-up in the fight against the PKK, saying the nightly bombing campaign had caused “terrorists to pay a very heavy price”, in comments quoted by state television TRT and d other media.

He said the attackers had come “infiltration from Syria” and that one of them “blew himself up”, his comments confirming media reports that what had started as a shootout also included a suicide attack.

A Syrian war monitor said Friday that Turkish drone strikes killed 27 civilians in Syria in a 24-hour military escalation after the deadly attack.

Turkish forces have “significantly intensified their air and ground attacks in northern and eastern Syria,” the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said.

It said it had documented 45 drone strikes and four fighter jet strikes targeting infrastructure, including water and electricity networks and gas stations.

The Turkish army rejects claims that it is striking civilian targets.

Erdogan chaired a security meeting in Istanbul on Thursday, shortly after arriving from Russia where he joined the BRICS summit of major emerging economy nations.