Three detained over PKK attack in Turkey’s Diyarbakır

DİYARBAKIR

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Three people were detained in conneciton to the outlawed Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK) bomb attack in the southeastern province of Diyarbakır, as the death toll of the Jan. 16 attack rose to four. 

Four police officers were killed and two others were wounded on Jan. 16 in a PKK bomb attack targeting an armored police vehicle in Diyarbakır’s Sur district. 

A bomb planted by PKK militants targeted a police vehicle that was near an excavation site at the Dicle University campus in the district. 

Police launched an investigation after the attack, detaining three people in the area for their suspected cooperation with the PKK militants who carried out the attack. The detainees were taken to the Diyarbakır police headquarters’ Anti-Terror Bureau for their testimonies to be taken. 

Investigations and operations in the area were ongoing, while treatment of the two injured soldiers continued. 

Meanwhile, the identities of the killled police officers have been revealed, as the bodies of Kadir Miraç Özcan, 28, Şenali Ocak, 26, Ali Sevim, 33, and Mahmut Ava, 28 were sent to different provinces for funeral ceremonies to be held. 

Özcan’s body was sent to the Black Sea province of Trabzon and was delivered to Trabzon Governor Yücel Yavuz, Trabzon Mayor Orhan Fevzi Gümrükçüoğlu as well as district heads of several parties and the relatives of Özcan. 

Ava’s body was sent to the southern province of Osmaniye, where his three-month pregnant wife participated in the funeral ceremony.

“You haven’t yet seen our child. You cannot say goodbye like this,” said the widowed Gülseren Ava at the ceremony. 

Ocak’s body was sent to the western province of İzmir for burial and Sevim’s body was sent to the Central Anatolian province of Eskişehir.