Suicide bombing kills Turkish guard at US Embassy in what Washington calls a terrorist attack
Video:
A suicide bomber set off an explosion outside the U.S. Embassy in
Ankara, Turkey on Friday. The blast killed two people, the suicide
bomber and the guard at the entrance gate.
Washington immediately warned Americans to stay away from all U.S. diplomatic facilities in Turkey and to be wary in large crowds.
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The attack drew condemnation from Turkey, the U.S., Britain and other nations and officials from both Turkey and the U.S. pledged to work together to fight terrorism.
“We strongly condemn what was a suicide attack against our embassy in Ankara, which took place at the embassy’s outer security perimeter,” said White House spokesman Jay Carney.
“A suicide bombing on the perimeter of an embassy is by definition an act of terror,” he said. “It is a terrorist attack.”
Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan said police believe the bomber was connected to a domestic leftist militant group. Carney, however, said the motive for the attack and who was behind it was not known.
A Turkish TV journalist was seriously wounded in the 1:15 p.m. blast in the Turkish capital, and two other guards had lighter wounds, officials said.
The state-run Anadolu Agency identified the bomber as Ecevit Sanli. It said the 40-year-old Turkish man was a member of the outlawed Revolutionary People’s Liberation Party-Front, or DHKP-C, which has claimed responsibility for assassinations and bombings since the 1970s.
The group has been designated a terrorist organization by the United States but had been relatively quiet in recent years.
Hillary Rodham Clinton, in her farewell speech to State Department staff moments after she formally resigned as secretary of state, said “we were attacked and lost one of our foreign service nationals.”
She said she spoke with U.S. Ambassador Francis Ricciardone, “our team there and my Turkish counterpart. I told them how much we valued their commitment and their sacrifice.”
Sen. John Kerry, the incoming secretary of state, also was briefed.
The U.S. Embassy building in Ankara is heavily protected and located near several other embassies, including those of Germany and France.
U.S. diplomatic facilities in Turkey have been targeted previously by terrorists. In 2008, an attack blamed on al-Qaida-affiliated militants outside the U.S. Consulate in Istanbul left three assailants and three policemen dead.
On Sept. 11, 2012, terrorists attacked a U.S. mission in Benghazi, Libya, killing U.S. Ambassador Chris Stevens and three other Americans. The attackers in Libya were suspected to have ties to Islamist extremists, and one is in custody in Egypt.
Friday’s bombing occurred at a security checkpoint at the side entrance to the U.S. Embassy, which is used by staff.
State Department spokeswoman Victoria Nuland said a man detonated a suicide vest at the checkpoint on the outer perimeter of the embassy compound.
“He came to this first point of access to the compound ... where you have to have your ID checked, you have to go through security,” Nuland said.
