| | | | Assailants opened fire on a car carrying the police chief of Diyarbakır, the main city in Turkey’s southeastern region, killing him and five other policemen Wednesday, Prime Minister Bülent Ecevit said. Four other police officers were injured, Diyarbakır Governor. Cemil Serhadlı told the Anatolia news agency. Prime Minister Bülent Ecevit said it was unclear who carried out the attack on Police Chief Gaffar Okkan. There was no claim of responsibility, but suspicion fell on Hizbullah, a pro-Islamic militant group. Okkan had received death threats from Hizbullah.
Police detained several suspects after the attack. Anatolia news agency quoted police as saying that at least four people took part in the attack and one of the assailants was apparently injured in the ensuing shootout with police. “This kind of treacherous attacks will not break the resolution and determination of the state and security forces to fight terrorism”, said Deputy Prime Minister Mesut Yılmaz. Okkan, who was appointed head of the Diyarbakır police three years ago, spearheaded a crackdown against Hizbullah last year, in which hundreds of the group’s members were arrested. Scores of bodies of presumed victims of the group were found in dungeons throughout the country. The police chief had released the names of 26 suspected Hizbullah hit men in a press conference last week, Anatolia said.
It is reported that one of the attackers was also hit yet fled the scene of the attack. Police Chief Okkan, on the job for the last three years, had been receiving threats from the terrorist organization Hizbullah, a shadowy Islamist group which has been implicated in more than 150 murders.
Turkish Hizbullah is not related to the Lebanese group of the same name.
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Diyarbakır marches for Okkan
