Turkey blames PKK for Istanbul attacks

[Dover]

Turkey blames PKK for Istanbul attacks

Turkey has pinned the blame for the deadly Istanbul bomb attacks squarely on Kurdish separatists, dismissing a rival claim of responsibility by a group aligning itself with al-Qaida.


Turkish officials said the Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK), which recently called off a unilateral ceasefire, was behind the bombs at two small hotels and a gas depot in Turkey's economic capital on Tuesday.

A Turk and an Iranian were killed and several foreign tourists were among the wounded.

"Without question this was done by the PKK, not al-Qaida," a senior police official in Ankara said.

"We are 100% sure."

The official denied reports that arrests had been made in connection with the attacks, for which both an al-Qaida-linked group and a previously unknown Kurdish group have claimed responsibility.
...cont'd

http://english.aljazeera.net/NR/exeres/7A16C494-92E8-4527-9BCD-C630CDF209A8.htm

[Tempest]

1. Bush Gave PKK Protected Status

http://www.rnw.nl/hotspots/html/irq040727.html

In an apparent turnaround, the United States military has conferred
"protected status" on members of the armed Iranian People's Mujahideen
Organisation currently based inside neighbouring Iraq. The same group
appears on the US list of terrorist organisations, with some 3,000
members of the group having been disarmed and placed under US custody
after the US-led invasion of Iraq.

[Zynx]

2. Wrong group

The PKK is the Kurdish Worker's Party, not the Iranian People's Mujahideen Organization.