German interior minister arrives in Turkey, will visit suicide attack site

BERLIN - Agence France-Presse

German Interior Minister Thomas de Maiziere arrives in Istanbul on Jan. 13, 2016, to visit site of suicide bomb attack. AA Photo

German Interior Minister Thomas de Maiziere arrived in Istanbul on Jan. 13 following a suicide bomb attack there that killed 10 tourists, most of them Germans, his ministry said.

De Maiziere will visit the site of the attack and then confer with Turkish officials, which will be followed by a press conference, a ministry spokesman said.
 
German Chancellor Angela Merkel said at least eight Germans were amongst the dead in the Jan. 12 attack and Berlin warned its nationals to keep away from public places and tourist attractions.    

Nine Germans were among the 15 injured.
 
The assault took place near the famous Blue Mosque in Sultanahmet, a district home to Istanbul's biggest concentration of historic monuments.
 
It is the first time that any recent attack in Turkey had specifically targeted tourists.

The Turkish government has said that an Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL) suicide bomber was behinde the attack. The militant jihadist group is also suspected of carrying out a double suicide bombing in October in Ankara, the Turkish capital, that killed more than 100 people.