Ankara bomber identified as 24-year-old PKK member

ANKARA

REUTERS photo

The suicide bomber who carried out the deadly car bomb attack in Ankara on March 13 has been identified as Seher Çağla Demir, who was a member of the outlawed Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK) born in 1992, the Interior Ministry has stated.

Born in 1992 in the Kağızman district of the eastern province of Kars, Demir had been a PKK member since 2013 and was trained by the People’s Protection Units (YPG), the military wing of Syria’s Democratic Union Party (PYD), after crossing into Syria, according to the ministry.

The official investigation into the attack, the third major suicide bomb blast to hit Ankara in five months, is still ongoing.

At least 37 people, including the suicide attacker, were killed and over 100 were wounded when a suicide car bomb attack struck a busy spot near Ankara’s Güvenpark in the capital’s central Kızılay neighborhood on March 13.

The father of Demir said early on March 14 that he would refuse to attend the funeral of his daughter if she turned out to be the bomber.

Interior Minister Efkan Ala said hours after the attack that there may be a second attacker involved in the bombing. 

Sources said a mixture of TNT, diesel fuel and plastic explosives were used in the attack. Police sources said the car was designed for attack in the southern provinces of Gaziantep or Hatay and loaded in Ankara.