Türkiye on Thursday marked the 10th anniversary of a car bombing in central Ankara, one of the deadliest attacks carried out by the PKK terror group during a wave of urban violence in 2015-2016.

The March 13, 2016, attack targeted bus stops in the capital’s busy Kızılay district, where a car packed with explosives was detonated at Güvenpark, killing 36 people and injuring 344 others.

Among those killed were four children. Thirty-two children were also among the wounded.

Authorities said the vehicle was detonated by PKK members Seher Çağla Demir and Özgür Ünsal. The attackers were killed in the explosion.

One of the victims was an unborn baby carried by six-month pregnant Songül Yılmaz, who was injured in the blast. The baby was later described as the youngest victim of the attack.

The bombing came after the PKK launched a violent campaign in several southeastern districts, including Şırnak, Silopi, Cizre, Nusaybin, Derik, Idil, Sur and Yüksekova, where militants dug trenches, erected barricades and declared so-called "autonomous zones.”

Security forces responded with operations to restore control in those areas. After failing to sustain the campaign, the group carried out the Güvenpark bombing targeting civilians waiting at bus stops in the capital.

Perpetrators brought to justice

Following the attack, the Ankara Chief Public Prosecutor’s Office launched an investigation that led to an indictment against 55 suspects, including senior PKK figures. The trial began on June 19, 2017, and concluded on Nov. 21, 2018, at an Ankara court.

Mehmet Veysi Dolaşan received 37 aggravated life sentences for the killing of 36 victims and for attempting to undermine the unity and territorial integrity of the state. He was also sentenced to an additional 10,260 years in prison for the attempted murder of the 344 people injured in the blast, along with further prison time and a fine for explosives-related offenses.

Two other defendants, Sebahattin Karakoç and Azamattin Karakoç, were also given aggravated life sentences.

In a separate trial concluded in November 2020, Ferit Ak and Salih Şahin were each sentenced to 15 years in prison for knowingly aiding the terrorist group.

The Güvenpark bombing remains one of the most devastating attacks in Ankara’s recent history and a stark reminder of the PKK’s campaign of violence targeting civilians in Türkiye.

Major PKK attacks

The PKK terrorist group has carried out numerous deadly attacks in Türkiye over the past decades, targeting both security forces and civilians as part of its terror campaign that began in 1984. More than 40,000 people have been killed since then.

Türkiye first sought a political solution to the PKK issue in the early 1990s under then-President Turgut Özal, who promoted a civilian approach and explored greater rights for the country’s Kurdish community. His outreach contributed to a brief PKK cease-fire, but the effort faltered after renewed attacks and Özal’s death in 1993.

The violence continued until PKK leader Abdullah Öcalan’s capture in 1999. A second peace initiative began in 2012, known as the reconciliation process, during which the government expanded cultural and language rights. The process collapsed in 2015, after which the PKK resumed attacks, prompting intensified Turkish counterterrorism operations at home and across the border.

The following year saw back-to-back PKK attacks across Türkiye, many involving explosives targeting security forces and civilians.

In January 2016, militants attacked a district police headquarters in the Çınar district of Diyarbakır with a truck bomb, rockets and gunfire, killing at least six people, including civilians and children, and wounding dozens.

Two months later, in March 2016, a car bomb targeting an armored police vehicle near a bus terminal in Diyarbakır killed seven police officers and injured 27 people, including civilians.

In May that year, a bomb-laden truck detonated in the Durumlu area of Diyarbakır after civilians intercepted the vehicle suspected of carrying explosives. The blast killed 16 people and wounded more than 20.

The attacks continued through the summer. In August 2016, a suicide car bomb struck a police checkpoint outside district headquarters in Cizre, in the southeastern province of Şırnak, killing 12 police officers and injuring dozens.

Later the same month, a car bomb targeting a police station in Elazığ killed at least six people and wounded more than 200 others.

In October 2016, another large car bomb targeted a military facility in the district of Şemdinli in Hakkari province, killing soldiers and civilians and injuring dozens more.

PKK disarmament

Today, Türkiye is working to bring a permanent end to PKK terrorism with its "terror-free Türkiye” initiative, first conceived in October 2024 by government ally Devlet Bahçeli, who extended an olive branch to Öcalan should he urge his terror group to lay down arms.

After Öcalan appealed to his group last year, the PKK formally disbanded, withdrawing all members from Turkish soil and even holding a symbolic ceremony in northern Iraq where a group of PKK members burned their weapons.

In Ankara, a cross-party parliamentary commission last month published a key report meant to prepare the legal groundwork to advance the process, backing plans to reintegrate former PKK members. Ankara has repeatedly ruled out amnesty for Öcalan or PKK terrorists, with officials saying the legal framework would only consider integration for PKK members who have not engaged in terrorist activities.

The report is expected to be put before Parliament sometime this month, likely after the end of Islam's holy month of Ramadan. If it passes, it will be the first concrete step taken by Türkiye.