Two suspects blow themselves up during police operation in Ankara

TIL Desk/World/Ankara-Two suicide bombers detonated their explosives during a police operation in the Turkish capital Ankara today after officers called on the suspects to surrender. There were no immediate reports of any other casualties in the blast, which occurred Saturday morning in the outskirts of the city.

Ankara governor Ercan Topaca told at the scene it was “likely” that they had connections to the outlawed Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK). “The materials used, the construction and the way it was planned point to the PKK a little,” he said.

The PKK — proscribed as a terrorist organisation by Turkey, the EU and US — has been waging a 32-year insurgency against the state in the country’s southeast. Violence returned to the region after the collapse of a two-year ceasefire last year. The governor said police began an operation early on Saturday to find the suspects after a tip-off came from Diyarbakir, a mainly Kurdish province in Turkey’s southeast.