Turkey blast kills 28, injures scores near Syrian border

An explosion has killed at least 27 in a municipal culture center in the southeastern province of Şanlıurfa’s Suruç district, as scores of people have been hospitalized, the Hurriyet Daily News reports.

“We are concerned that the number of death will increase. The perpetrators will soon be found and put on trial,” Turkey’s interior minister said in a statement on July 20.

There is speculation that the blast was caused by a 18-year-old female suicide bomber from the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL).

At least 300 members of the Federation of Socialist Youth Associations (SGDF) were staying at the Amara Culture Center as part of a summer expedition to help rebuild Kobane, which lies directly across the border from Suruç.

The culture center, which is run by the Suruç Municipality under the control of the Peoples’ Democratic Party (HDP), frequently hosts visiting journalists and volunteers who work with refugees from Kobane.

Emil Lazarian

“I should like to see any power of the world destroy this race, this small tribe of unimportant people, whose wars have all been fought and lost, whose structures have crumbled, literature is unread, music is unheard, and prayers are no more answered. Go ahead, destroy Armenia . See if you can do it. Send them into the desert without bread or water. Burn their homes and churches. Then see if they will not laugh, sing and pray again. For when two of them meet anywhere in the world, see if they will not create a New Armenia.” - WS