Following an explosion which killed a cleaning woman and injured another, an armed Kurdish group is claiming responsibility for what it describes as a mortar attack on Sabiha Gokcen airport in Istanbul.
“We … claim the attack carried out by mortar bombs at Istanbul’s Sabiha Gokcen airport [on Wednesday],” the Freedom Falcons of Kurdistan (TAK) said on its website.
Turkish authorities have said little about what might have caused the explosions at Istanbul’s second international airport.
Turkey launched an offensive against the Kurdistan Worker’s party (PKK) after it began an armed uprising in the name of Kurdish independence in 1984.
Officials say TAK is a front for PKK attacks on civilian targets, but the PKK claims TAK is a splinter group over which it has no control.
TAK on its website, said that President Erdogan and ISIL had formed a “war coalition” against the Kurds.
It also said the airport attack was a response to the “fascist attacks that turn Kurdish cities into ruins”.
On Saturday, the Turkish military said that about 200 PKK rebels had been killed in an army offensive in the south-east centred on the province of Sirnak and city of Diyarbakir.
Guardian
