Turkish diplomat says Reyhanlı attack carried out by al-Qaeda

April 13th, 2014

David Schulberg

In a stunning revelation, a Turkish diplomat has for the first time admitted that the bloody Reyhanlı attack, which ravaged the border town of Reyhanlı on May 11, 2013, leaving 53 people dead and scores wounded, was carried out by Syrian elements of al-Qaeda, not by groups, as is widely believed in Turkey, affiliated with the Bashar al-Assad regime.

The remarks came at a meeting of the Permanent Council of the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE) on March 27. In response to a comment by an Armenian diplomat, Turkey’s OSCE representative, Tacan İldem, said that al-Qaeda elements operating from Syria carried out the attack, abandoning the long-standing Turkish line that Damascus was responsible for the atrocity in the border town.

İldem spoke on the issue when the Armenian diplomat called on Turkey to take effective measures against radical groups using the Turkish border as a conduit to stage attacks against Christians, especially Armenians in the town of Kessab, the site of bitter fighting between regime troops and opposition forces.

Denying allegations that Turkey gives the go-ahead to radical groups coming through its border, İldem deemed the claims nonsensical, saying that Turkey also faces security threats from radical elements. An attack on security forces in the central Anatolian province of Niğde, the Turkish diplomat said, had been carried out by radical elements, leaving three dead — a police officer, a gendarme and a civilian passerby.

Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdoğan publicly accused Syria’s Assad of using terrorist tactics to foment unrest and disorder in neighboring countries that support the Syrian opposition and provide relief to refugees.

In a September 2012 statement threatening the Turkish government with a series of “suicide attacks” and bombings in İstanbul and Ankara, the al-Qaeda-linked Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL) claimed responsibility for the twin car bombings in the town of Reyhanlı.

This statement, however, met with skepticism and denial from Turkish officials. Then-Interior Minister Muammer Güler denied allegations that the perpetrators of the May attack in Reyhanlı were members of al-Qaeda, saying that the real culprits of the deadly explosion are known and under arrest.

The attack highlighted the risk emanating from the prolonged Syrian conflict for neighboring countries, which are struggling to accommodate floods of Syrian refugees. In addition to the unfolding humanitarian tragedy and the refugee issue, neighboring countries face risks of getting dragged into the conflict against their wishes and plans, with border-crossing opposition elements and brief Syrian incursions inviting military responses, as was the case when the Turkish and Syrian armies exchanged fire several times last year.

The Reyhanlı attack prompted Turkey to revisit its security strategies and policies along the 911-kilometer-long border, beefing up its military presence to establish firm control in the area.

Turkey currently hosts around 900,000 Syrian refugees. Among them, 80,000 are reportedly housed in Reyhanlı.

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