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US Consulate attack in Istanbul: Suspect is member of DHKP-C

10 August 2015 18:08 (UTC +04:00)

Baku-APA. The woman suspected of participating in US consulate attack is member of far-left DHKP-C, police say

The woman suspected of participating in an armed attack on the U.S. Consulate General in Istanbul Monday and later apprehended by Turkish security forces, was identified as a member of the far-left Revolutionary People's Liberation Party-Front (DHKP-C), APA reports quoting Anadolu Agency.

According to police sources, 42-year-old Hatice Asik was designated as a potential suicide bomber candidate by the far-left group. Photos of Asik had been distributed to security units throughout the country after it was claimed that she had plans to commit a suicide attack on the Turkish Ministry of Justice in September of this year.

Asik had spent three years in jail but was released a month ago, on July 8, pending verdict in a trial in which she was a suspect, according to judicial sources.

She was being tried for her alleged involvement in a bomb attack on a police station in Istanbul’s Yenibosna district in 2012.

She was accused of willfully helping the DHKP-C, attempting murder and "attempting to change the constitutional order". She was one of six suspects being tried.

The attack on the consulate in the northern Sariyer district of Istanbul, in which no casualties have been reported, occurred early Monday morning.

Asik was wounded and then apprehended in a building near the consulate by security forces. Police are conducting a large-scale operation to find the second assailant.

According to an eyewitness, Engin Yuksek, a Sariyer district resident, the other assailant is also female.

Yuksek said police demanded that the suspects, who were carrying bags, surrender but one of them replied: “I will never surrender to you. We've come here to take revenge for Suruc [attack].”

The consulate in Istanbul has been closed to the public until further notice, said a written statement released on the consulate’s Twitter account.

The consulate attack came after another on a police station in Istanbul Monday morning, which killed one police officer and wounded at least 11 people, including four other police officers. The police officer, who was injured in the gunfight, died at the hospital. It has yet to be determined whether the two attacks are related.