Turkey close to identifying one of Ankara suicide bombers, says PM Davutoğlu
| AA photo


Ankara is close to identifying the two suicide bombers who killed 97 people and wounded over 200 in Ankara on Saturday, Prime Minister Ahmet Davutoğlu said on Monday. In an interview with private broadcaster NTV, Davutoğlu said, "We are close to a name, which points to an organization."Saturday's blasts have shaken Turkey, as the country faces snap general elections in three weeks, military operations in the southeast and the ongoing civil war on its southern border in Syria. The attack targeted leftwing and pro-Kurdish activists who had gathered for a peace rally.Davutoğlu declined to identify the organization suspected of being behind the blasts, while the investigation was ongoing, but said the focus was on the Islamic State of Iraq and al-Sham (ISIS), which is also suspected of being linked to the Suruç suicide bombing in July that killed 33 pro-Kurdish activists.Referring to ISIS, the PKK and the leftist group, the Revolutionary People's Liberation Party-Front (DHKP-C), he said, "For us, these three organizations are seen as a potential focus for the crime, and right from the start we gave priority to ISIS when looking at the method and general trend.""We ascertained how these two suicide bombers arrived in the square and how they carried the bombs," he said, and explained that a large amount of evidence has been gathered over the past 48 hours. Addressing concerns about the level of security provided for Saturday's rally, he said the "necessary steps" would be taken if there were any "weakness and negligence," but he denied that there had been any holes in security arrangements for the protest.He also warned of "far-reaching threats" against Turkish democracy. Davutoğlu criticized comments made by Republican People's Party (CHP) Chairman Kemal Kılıçdaroğlu after a meeting between the two on Sunday, revealing the content of their discussion.After the meeting, Kılıçdaroğlu held a press conference in which he said that he had been told that both suicide bombers were male. Davutoğlu criticized Kılıçdaroğlu on Monday for "disclosing" intelligence at the press conference and said that Kılıçdaroğlu should not have shared the information with the public at that point. Davutoğlu also criticized Kılıçdaroğlu for not signing his party's name to a declaration of condemnation for the terror attack, which was shared by the Prime Ministry Coordination Center following their meeting.He also criticized Peoples' Democratic Party (HDP) Co-Chair Selahattin Demirtaş for an impromptu media briefing he gave Saturday in which he held the government responsible for the blasts. "He can criticize me as a prime minister and as Justice and Development Party [AK Party] chairman," Davutoğlu said, "But he loses his grievance when he says the state conducted these murders."Davutoğlu said the attacks that targeted the gathering of activists for a rally to call for peace were aimed to "cast a shadow" over Turkey's Nov. 1 elections and to influence the result. He rejected accusations that Turkey was being drawn into the crisis in Syria, and said, "These attacks won't turn Turkey into a Syria."The AK Party has suspended its election rallies until Friday in response to the Ankara suicide bombings, the party spokesman Ömer Çelik, said on Monday at a press conference in Ankara. He said the party's subsequent rallies would be held under the theme of "unity against terror."The twin suicide bombings in Ankara – the deadliest attack in modern Turkish history – were set off by two suspected suicide attackers in a crowd of leftist, pro-Kurdish and union activists at a peace rally. The attacks near Ankara's main train station left the bodies of dead demonstrators strewn across the ground. The bombings also wounded 246 people, dozens of whom were hospitalized and are in intensive care, according to the Prime Ministry.