Fourth victim dies from attack on Turkey party rally

ISTANBUL

HDP’s co-chair Selahattin Demirtaş visited the memorial at the spot of the bombing in Diyarbakır on June 12. DHA photo

The death toll from an attack on a rally of Turkey’s Kurdish problem-focused People’s Democratic Party (HDP) rose to four on June 13, when a 65-year-old died from his wounds, Doğan News Agency said.
 
The June 5 attack on an HDP pre-election rally in the southeastern city of Diyarbakır, caused by a bomb stuffed with ball bearings, came two days ahead of the June 7 legislative elections in which the party scored a major breakthrough.
 
Severely wounded Ali Türkman, 65, succumbed to his injuries in a Diyarbakır hospital, Doğan News Agency said. More than 100 more were also wounded. 
 
The toll given by Doğan News Agency does not include a fifth fatality, Ramazan Yıldız, 16, who fell from trees at the rally in circumstances that remain unclear.
 
Prime Minister Ahmet Davutoğlu said one suspect had been arrested over the attack and was being checked for links to militant groups but has given no further details.
 
The HDP won 13 percent of the vote and 80 seats in last weekend’s election, a result hailed as a historic breakthrough for a Kurdish political force in Turkey.
 
The HDP’s co-chair Selahattin Demirtaş this week blamed the attack on Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL) jihadists who have taken swathes of Iraq and Syria on the other side of the Turkish border.
 
Demirtaş said on June 12 he feared pro-ISIL formations had created "cells" inside Turkey and were waiting for orders to cause "chaos" in the country.

Four people were also killed on June 9 in clashes between rival Kurdish groups that inflamed tensions in Diyarbakır.