Turkey arrests suspect, accuses PKK for Istanbul explosion

ERBIL, Kurdistan Region - Turkey on Monday accused the Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK) of being behind the explosion on a crowded Istanbul street, killing six and wounding dozens a day prior, adding that a person suspected of carrying out the attack was arrested.

An explosion targeted Istanbul’s famous Istiklal Street on Sunday afternoon, killing at least six and injuring 81 others.

“The person who carried out the incident and dropped the bomb was detained by the teams of our Istanbul Police Department,” Turkey’s state-owned Anadolu Agency cited the country’s Interior Minister Suleyman Soylu as saying early Monday, vowing to “retaliate” against those responsible.

Soylu said that according to their assessments, “the order for the action came from Kobane” in northern Syria, accusing the PKK and the People’s Protection Units (YPG) of being behind the attack.

The Kurdish armed groups are yet to respond to Turkey’s claims.

Turkey claims that the YPG is the Syrian offshoot of the PKK. Both groups are designated as terrorist organizations by Ankara.

Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan initially said that “it might be wrong” to attribute the explosion to “terrorism”, but claimed that, based on the initial information provided by the governor “there is a smell of terror here.”

Officials of the Kurdistan Region, the United States, Ukraine, Greece, and France have expressed solidarity with Turkey and condemned the deadly explosion.

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