CHP leader questions if Ankara attackers were on ‘suicide bombers list’

ANKARA

CHP leader Kemal Kılıçdaroğlu speaks during a live interview with CNNTürk.

The responsibility for the Oct. 10 twin suicide bombings in Ankara is on government’s shoulders, Republican People’s Party (CHP) leader Kemal Kılıçdaroğlu said Oct. 13, also criticizing the government’s foreign policy. 
Recalling Prime Minister Ahmet Davutoğlu’s remarks that the security forces had a list of suspected suicide bombers, Kılıçdaroğlu asked if the attackers in Ankara were on that list. 

“He says ‘we have a list.’ I want to ask Davutoğlu, were those two suicide bombers on that list or not,” Kılıçdaroğlu said in a live interview on CNNTürk news channel. “If they were, there is a much bigger disaster.”

Prime Minister Davutoğlu said on Oct. 12 that Turkey has a list of suspects who may carry out suicide bombings but cannot take legal action unless suspects commit a crime. He also said Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL) was the prime suspect for the Oct. 10 attacks, which claimed at least 97 lives. 

According to Kılıçdaroğlu, Turkey “is not being run well.”

“He [Davutoğlu] says there is a list of suicide bombers, but they cannot arrest them before they act,” said the CHP leader. “Ahmet Şık wrote a book and was put in prison. There are tens of similar examples. IF an executive starts making excuses for failure, this means he cannot run things.”

Kılıçdaroğlu also slammed the government’s foreign policy. 

“When I first talked about the Middle East swamp, they reacted,” said the main opposition leader.

“Now, Turkey is in that swamp. Davutoğlu himself told me that the sleeping cells are not regular ISIL types, but people who shave and wear ties. And he said the cells were ready to act on order. These are all known, the places where ISIL is present are known.”

According to Kılıçdaroğlu, the government is afraid of talking about ISIL.

“They are afraid that ISIL can make new attacks, because there is weakness in intelligence,” he said.

“MİT [National Intelligence Agency] is not doing its real job. I don’t mean the entire MİT, but a group inside it only serves to the party in power,” Kılıçdaroğlu added.