TURKEY: Syria has turned over to Turkey 22 suspects who may have played a role in four suicide bomb attacks that killed 61 people in Istanbul, the state-run Anatolian news agency said yesterday.
The suspects escaped Turkey in the days following the November attacks, the agency said quoting a statement from the Ankara security services.
Several of the detained are believed to have links with Azad Ekinci, who investigators suspect was a key planner of the suicide bombings, the agency added. Ekinci is believed to have escaped Turkey.
Turkey has charged 21 people in the attacks that struck two Istanbul synagogues on November 15 and the offices of British-based bank HSBC and the British consulate five days later.
Police said yesterday they had identified the man responsible for the bombing of HSBC Bank's Turkish headquarters and were also close to naming the group involved in four attacks in Istanbul between November 15th and 21st. Ismail Kuncak, a 46-year old spice seller from the impoverished Istanbul suburb of Bagcilar, had previously been thought to have left Turkey. Yesterday's Turkish newspapers quoted acquaintances who said he had disappeared two months ago, claiming he was going to Mecca.
Popular daily Hurriyetsaid the pick-up truck used in the attack on the British Consulate had been hidden on his property. It is still not clear whether the traces of bomb-making materials, reportedly found in Kuncak's warehouse, were used for his own suicide attack. But his apparent link with the British Consulate bombing gave credence to the argument that all four attacks were the work of the same group.
Further evidence in support of that view came out on Saturday, when the Turkish police confirmed that they had arrested and charged a man believed to have masterminded one of the two November 15th synagogue attacks.
"It is understood that the arrested person carried out intelligence-gathering on Beth Israel synagogue before the attack, went to the location with other accomplices on the day of the attack and ordered the start of the attack", Istanbul's deputy police chief Halil Yilmaz said. He declined to name the suspect.
However Turkish newspapers yesterday identified him as Yusuf Polat, also from Bagcilar. He is the first major figure to be charged in connection with the four bombings. Polat was stopped on Tuesday as he tried to cross the Turkish-Iranian border. But his connection to the attack dates back to the discovery of suicide bomber Mesut Cabuk's mobile phone. The two men spoke minutes before Cabuk blew himself up. - (Additional reporting Reuters)