Ankara bomb blasts- Thousands of people mourn victims in central Ankara

Turkey is suspecting Islamic State (ISIS) could be behind the Ankara bombings that left around 100 people dead, said Turkish Prime Minister Ahmet Davutoglu.

The Turkish interior minister, Selami Altinok, said Ankara was taking extra security precautions after Saturday’s bombing.

“We investigate Daesh as our No. 1 priority”, Davutoglu said, using the Arabic name for ISIS.

Yeni Safak, the paper known to be close to the government, said investigators were testing DNA samples obtained from families of a few 20 Turks they believe are IS militants and prepared to carry out suicide bombings.

Turkey’s prime minister says authorities are close to identifying one of the suicide bombers who carried out the blasts in Ankara that killed 97 people.

No one has yet claimed responsibility for the bombings, which occurred at Ankara’s main train station but which struck as a rally organised by pro-Kurdish activists and civic groups was under way nearby. A pro-Kurdish party has said that up to 128 people died in the attacks Saturday.

A protester is overcome with emotion during a rally to protest Saturday’s explosions in Ankara, Turkey, Sunday, October 11, 2015.

Even before the attacks, the president was under enormous political pressure after his Justice and Development Party (AKP) lost its overall majority in June 7 polls for the first time since it came to power in 2002. Since the collapse of a ceasefire in July, more than 2,000 PKK fighters and 150 Turkish security personnel have been killed in renewed hostilities, Anadolu reported.

Erdogan’s opponents now accuse him and his interim government of rallying nationalist votes by fomenting violence between the Kurdish rebels and security forces; Erdogan denies this, saying government forces are responding to increased attacks.

But the Turkish army kept up its campaign with more air raids on southeast Turkey and northern Iraq, killing 49 suspected PKK militants over the last two days, the official Anatolia news agency reported.

ISIS has been frequently blamed for these attacks, although the group has not claimed responsibility, which is unusual.

On Monday, hundreds of people chanting anti-government slogans marched towards a mosque in an Istanbul suburb for the funeral of several victims of the twin bombings.

The leader of the HDP, Selahattin Demirtas, said the state had attacked the people – and that the people of Turkey should be the recipients of global condolences, not President Erdogan.

On Monday, a top PKK commander said the group would stick to a ceasefire pledge announced at the weekend.