Arriving at Istanbul’s Ataturk airport by taxi, three suicide attackers opened fire before blowing themselves up when shot at by police.
At least 41 people were killed and 239 were injured. Turkish Prime Minister Binali Yildirim confirmed that foreign nationals were among the dead, and officials later said that one Iranian and one Ukrainian had been killed.
President Recep Tayyip Erdogan said the incident should be treated as a pivotal moment in the fight against global terrorism.
'The bombs that exploded in Istanbul today could have gone off at any airport in any city around the world,' he said. He pledged a continued battle 'against all terrorist organizations at all costs until the end of terrorism.'
Hours after the incident, some flights to Istanbul’s Atatürk Airport resumed. Do?an News Agency quoted Turkish Airlines officials as saying that flights from Taipei, Manila and Seoul were the first to land at the airport.
SECURITY ON ALERT IN TURKEY
Turkey is facing an increasingly unstable situation, with an outside threat from IS in neighboring Syria, along with the decades-old domestic conflict with the Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK). Though the Ankara government and Kurdish militants are still standing in opposition to one another, they are both showing a determination to fight against the IS group.
Turkish officials have blamed recent attacks across the country on either the IS or the PKK.
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