Woman carrying grenades killed near Istanbul police HQ

In a second evening of violence in Istanbul, Turkish police shot dead a woman carrying guns and hand grenades and detained a man as they tried to attack police headquarters in the city, officials said.

The incident was the third attack on an official building in the country in the past two days.

A photograph published by local media showed a red-haired woman lying on the ground with a rifle strapped to her body and a handgun by her side. Television footage showed police vehicles sealing off the street in the central Aksaray neighbourhood.

“The Istanbul police headquarters . . . was targeted by rifle fire and a female terrorist was killed in the clash,” the Istanbul governor’s office said in a statement.

Officials said that the woman was carrying a rifle, two hand grenades and one pistol.

Istanbul governor Vasip Sahin said that a policeman was slightly injured in the assault. It was not immediately clear who was behind the attack.

The incident follows a fatal hostage situation in the city yesterday, when a prosecutor and two gunmen holding him at an Istanbul courthouse were killed in a shootout between police and the assailants.

Following services for the slain prosecutor, Turkey’s prime minister Ahmet Davutoglu pledged to track down any accomplices in the hostage incident, saying the two gunmen were making phone calls abroad during the six-hour standoff.

Authorities believe the two assailants belonged to a banned left-wing group, DHKP-C.

Mr Davutoglu did not name the country linked to the phone calls, but said the government would release more information as its investigation went on.

“I gave the orders for all sorts of operations against whoever perpetrated the incident, wherever they may be,” Mr Davutoglu said.

“No one should think that the attack will go without a response.

“We shall find out where the order came from. We will investigate who is behind this network.”

Prosecutor’s investigation

The slain prosecutor, Mehmet Selim Kiraz, was investigating the death of a teenager hit by a police gas canister during nationwide anti-government protests in 2013.

The hostage-takers had made five demands, including a request that the police held responsible for the teenager’s killing confess to the death and be tried by “peoples’ courts”.

Meanwhile, police in the southern city of Antalya detained 19 people suspected of belonging to DHKP-C, the state-run Anadolu Agency reported.

The agency said the suspects, many of them students, were being interrogated by anti-terrorism police. Ten other suspects were detained in the cities of Izmir and Eskisehir.

Local media also reported that DHKP-C sympathisers clashed with police in two Istanbul neighbourhoods overnight, while riot police also detained 36 students at Istanbul University after posters referring to one of the dead hostage-takers were put up in the law faculty.

The DHKP-C, which seeks a socialist state, is considered a terrorist organisation by Turkey, the EU and the US. The group has carried out sporadic attacks, including a suicide bombing on the US embassy in 2013 that killed a security guard.

Funeral speech

Mr Davutoglu, speaking in Istanbul after joining thousands of other mourners for Mr Kiraz’s funeral, said the hostage incident aimed to create chaos ahead of Turkey’s June 7th general election.

He criticised opposition parties for not taking part in the funeral and said the courthouse would be renamed in honour of the prosecutor.

Police had earlier overpowered an armed man who stormed the ruling party’s office in Istanbul, forcing employees out and shouting slogans against the party. No one was hurt in the incident.

Reuters and PA