Six people were killed and 53 were injured in an explosion on a busy street in central Istanbul on Sunday. The area in the Beyoglu district, Turkey’s largest city, was crowded with families and tourists spending their time on the weekend. Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan described the blast as an attack that “smells like terrorism”.
Police immediately cordoned off the area after the blast. Several videos of the explosion went viral on social media, in which several people could be seen lying on the ground and others running from the scene.
Erdogan said, “Attempts to defeat Turkey and the Turkish people through terrorism will fail today as they did yesterday and will happen again tomorrow. Our people can rest assured that the perpetrators of the attack will be punished.” ” Preliminary information suggested that “a woman played a part in it”.
“It would be wrong to say that this is undoubtedly a terrorist attack, but the initial developments and initial intelligence from my governor is that it smells of terrorism,” he said.
While no organization has claimed responsibility for the attack, Turkey has in the past been a target of Kurdish and Islamist militants, who organized a series of attacks in the country during 2015-16.
Several world leaders condemned the attack and offered their condolences to the victims of the blast. European Council President Charles Michel expressed his condolences on Twitter and tagged the explosion as “horrific news”.
News agency Reuters spoke to several eyewitnesses to the explosion who claimed that people froze after the loud bang. Mehmet Akus, 45, who works at a restaurant on Istiklal, said, “When I heard the explosion, I was scared, people looked at each other. Then people started running away. What else can you do.”
“My relatives called me, they know I work at Istiklal. I reassured them,” he told Reuters.
The last attack on Turkey was in 2016 when two bombs exploded outside a football stadium in Istanbul, killing 38 people and injuring 155. The militant wing of the Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK) claimed responsibility for the blast.
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