Angry protests in Turkey after bomber kills 50 at wedding party for pro-Kurdish party member

by WorldTribune Staff, August 21, 2016

Angry mourners on Aug. 21 threw bottles at police and chanted “murderer Erdogan” at a gathering for the funerals of some of the 51 people killed in a bombing at a wedding party for a pro-Kurdish party member.

Relatives grieve at a hospital Aug. 20, 2016, in Gaziantep following a late night militant attack on a wedding party. /Getty Images
Relatives grieve at a hospital in Gaziantep following an Aug. 20 terror attack on a wedding party. /Getty Images

The bomber detonated an explosives vest as people danced in the street at the Aug. 20 wedding party in the city of Gaziantep. Another 69 people were wounded, 17 of them seriously, at the wedding party for a member of the pro-Kurdish Peoples’ Democratic Party.

Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan said on Aug. 21 that the bomber was a 12- to 14-year-old with likely ties to Islamic State of Iraq and Levant (ISIL).

Media have reported that ISIL has been blamed for other attacks in Turkey targeting Kurdish gatherings in an effort “to inflame ethnic tensions.”

Erdogan said there was “no difference” between ISIL, Kurdish militants of the PKK, and followers of U.S.-based cleric Fethullah Gulen, whom he blames for the coup attempt last month.

“Our country and our nation have again only one message to those who attack us – you will not succeed,” he said.

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