TURKEY: A Kurdish rebel group said it was behind a bombing in a Turkish resort yesterday that wounded 20 people and warned it would carry out further attacks, a news agency close to the rebels said.
The Kurdistan Liberation Hawks (TAK), a militant wing of the banned Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK), told the Europe-based Mezopotamya News Agency it had planted the bomb in Cesme, an Aegean Sea town popular with Turkish and foreign tourists.
"A person describing himself as an official from TAK telephoned Mezopotamya and said that they were responsible for the attack in Cesme today," the agency said. "The person said that such attacks on tourist areas would continue," Mezopotomya said.
The agency, which serves as a mouthpiece for the PKK, said TAK had warned authorities before the bombing, which occurred in the early afternoon in the centre of the seaside resort.
The blast was caused by either a fragmentation bomb or a pipe bomb placed in a waste bin outside a bank, officials said. The site is also close to Cesme's municipality.
A British citizen and Russian national were among the victims, a police officer said. She said both men were being treated in hospital for their injuries which were not life-threatening. One victim was in a critical condition.
Turkish officials have warned in recent months that the PKK could step up attacks in western Turkey and other urban centres.
The PKK has limited most of its attacks to the mainly Kurdish southeast, but claimed responsibility in April for a bombing in Kusadasi, another Aegean Sea resort centre. One police officer died in that attack.
The armed separatist group has fought for independence since 1984, and more than 30,000 people have died in the violence. It called off a unilateral truce last year and has since stepped up its attacks on military and strategic targets.
A witness who was injured in yesterday's attack said he saw two men in their mid-20s deposit a package in the waste bin about 30 minutes before the explosion.
"I was sitting in front of the rubbish bin that exploded. Two people came and left a black nylon bag," Ramazan Mert said.
Police sealed off the area and were examining security camera footage of the site of the blast, the state-run Anatolian news agency said.
Islamic militants and far-left radicals are also active in Turkey and have carried out similar attacks.
Turkey's worst peacetime attack was in November 2003, when a Turkish cell in the al- Qaeda network carried out four suicide bombings against Jewish and British targets.
More than 60 people were killed and hundreds were wounded in the attacks.