MESOP LATEST : US-based SITE Intelligence Group claimed ISIS responsibility only / Confusion over deadly Turkey’s Diyarbakir bombing claims / If confirmed, the Islamist State claim of responsibility would be its first for an attack in Turkey

5 Nov 2016  -DIYARBAKIR-AMED, Turkey’s Kurdish region,— Confusion reigned Sunday over who carried out an attack in Turkey that left 11 dead, with one source claiming it was the Islamic State but authorities insisting Kurdish militants were to blame.

Turkish Prime Minister Binali Yildirim had said Friday’s bombing near police headquarters in Diyarbakir [Amed] was carried out by the Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK), which has regularly targeted security forces since ending a truce in 2015.But the US-based SITE Intelligence Group cited an “insider source” for the IS-affiliated Amaq news agency as saying “fighters from the Islamic State detonated an explosives-laden vehicle parked in front of a Turkish police headquarters in Diyarbakir in southeastern Turkey.”

The local governorate in Diyarbakir on Saturday then issued a new statement insisting the bombing was carried out by the PKK, saying this conclusion was based on intercepted radio conversations.It said that the three tonnes of explosives used in the bombing were activated by a PKK operative with the codename “Kemal”.

“This information clearly shows that the attack was carried out by the separatist terror organisation,” it said, using the customary official phrase for the PKK. The early morning attack on a police headquarters in the main Kurdish city of Diyarbakir initially left nine people dead, including two police officers, and over 100 wounded.

The state-run Anadolu news agency said the toll rose to 11 on Saturday after two more civilian victims succumbed to their wounds.The explosion left a swathe of devastation, blowing out the entire front of a nearby apartment block and leaving the surroundings covered in rubble.Emergency workers on Saturday sifted through the damage while residents arrived to recuperate whatever belongings they could salvage, an AFP photographer said. The pro-Kurdish People’s Democratic Party (HDP) said six of its MPs, including its co-leaders, had narrowly escaped injury in the attack as they were being held in the police complex following their detention overnight.

If confirmed, the Islamist State claim of responsibility would be its first for an attack in Turkey, although the jihadist group has been blamed over the last year for a series of strikes against Kurdish activists, tourists and on Istanbul airport. There has so far been no denial or claim of responsibility from the PKK. www.mesop.de