A suicide bomber attacked the US embassy in the Turkish capital, Ankara, yesterday. The blast killed a Turkish guard and wounded a visiting Turkish journalist, according to officials. The Obama administration called the attack an act of terror and warned American citizens to temporarily avoid its diplomatic missions in Turkey.
Interior minister Muammer Guler said the bomber was a known member of an outlawed leftist radical group in Turkey, suggesting that the motive may have differed from the Islamist militant hostility toward the US that has been a theme of other attacks on US diplomatic facilities in recent months. But US officials said the motives and those responsible for the bombing in Ankara remained under investigation.
In Washington, White House spokesman Jay Carney told reporters: “The attack itself is clearly an act of terror.” Vice-president Joe Biden, who was attending a security summit in Germany, also said the bombing was “obviously as a terrorist attack on our embassy in Ankara”.