Off the wire
• Tanzania launches five-year plan to boost industrialization  • Hydrogen-powered trolleybuses likely to start running in Riga next year  • Roundup: Chinese music industry attracts more int'l professionals  • Syria's Assad pledges to keep fighting terror  • Emergency committee on Zika virus to convene next week: WHO  • Morocco's economic growth hits 4.5 pct in 2015  • EU extends condolences to people hit by Istanbul terrorist attack  • Interview: Danfoss chief says willing to help China achieve carbon emissions target  • Grenade explosion injures 4 in Burundian capital  • Nairobi bourse up on banks, energy and telecom shares  
You are here: 　 Home

1st LD Writethru: UN chief slams deadly terrorist attack in Istanbul

Xinhua, June 8, 2016 Adjust font size:

UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon on Tuesday condemned a deadly terrorist attack in Istanbul, Turkey, which killed 11 people, voicing his hope that "the perpetrators of this despicable terrorist attack will be identified and brought to justice."

Ban "extends his sincere condolences to the families of the victims and wishes those injured a speedy recovery," UN spokesman Stephane Dujarric said at a daily news briefing here, reading a prepared statement. "The United Nations stands in solidarity with the people and Government of Turkey at this difficult time."

The explosion in the heart of Istanbul, reportedly caused earlier Tuesday by a car bomb targeting a police bus, claimed the lives of at least 11 people and injured dozens more. The killed included seven members of the police force, reports said.

The bomb blast occurred during rush hour at 08:15 a.m. local time, as car was detonated when a police bus passed through in Vezneclier, a tourist destination district in Istanbul. No party has claimed responsibility for the attack.

Turkey saw four bomb blasts throughout this year. In January, dozens of German tourists were killed in a suicide bomb attack in Istanbul. Another bomb attack ripped through a military parade in February, killed 28 people.

In March, 35 people were killed in bomb attacks carried out by Kurds militants in Turkish capital of Ankara. In separated occasion in the same month, four people were killed in a suicide bomb blast in an Istanbul shopping area. Endit