An explosion aboard a passenger bus killed two Turks and injured 10 others near a Mediterranean resort, authorities said Monday. The attack was followed by a second bomb in a central Istanbul park, which injured a sanitation worker. The Anatolia news agency reported that a second device was defused in Ankara. The cause of the Sunday night explosion near the popular resort town of Manavgat in Antalya Province was not clear. Police would not say whether it was a terrorist attack. "We're thoroughly investigating it," the Anatolia news agency quoted Police Chief Naciye Ekmekcibasi of Antalya as saying. The bus was traveling from the southern city of Adana to Antalya, the agency said. All passengers were Turks, authorities said Monday. The injured were reported to be in stable condition. The agency said the explosion partly tore the bus into pieces. Police prevented two reporters from taking pictures and briefly detained them, the agency said.
The Istanbul explosion occurred at 9:35 a.m. at the central Taksim Promenade, on the European side of the city that straddles the Bosphorus. "A worker for a private cleaning company discovered a package, which exploded as he threw it into a litter box," Istanbul police chief Celalettin Cerrah told reporters at the site of the incident. He said the device, a so-called "noise bomb," was apparently not intended to cause serious damage or injuries, although the victim, a man in his 50s, suffered slight wounds to his hands and face. No one had claimed responsibility for the blast, police said.
In Ankara, an explosive device was defused outside a police station early Monday, Anatolia said quoting police. The device was wired-up to a timer and set to go off at 7:00 a.m., but was detected in time by a police patrol, the report said.
Several extreme-left movements active in Istanbul and Ankara have used similar explosive devices in the past. Police have also blamed rebels from the outlawed Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK) for a string of attacks in recent months, both in Istanbul and elsewhere in the country. Twin suicide attacks blamed on the Al-Qaeda network left 63 people dead and wounded 750 others in Istanbul in November 2003.