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Flights from Berlin to Istanbul cancelled after terror attack

DPA/The Local
DPA/The Local - [email protected]
Flights from Berlin to Istanbul cancelled after terror attack
Turkish police block the road after an suicide bomb attack at Atatürk Airport in Istanbul. Photo: EPA.

All flights from Berlin's Tegel airport to Istanbul have been cancelled after a suicide bomb attack killed at least 36 people in the city's major airport.

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Berlin’s Tegel airport said on Wednesday that all flights to Istanbul had been cancelled in response to the suicide bombings that killed at least 36 people at Atatürk Airport on Tuesday evening.

Normally Tegel has five flights to Istanbul on Wednesday. A Turkish Airlines flight on Tuesday evening bound for Turkey’s most populous city and carrying 209 people was sent back to Tegel.

Three suicide bombers stormed Atatürk Airport on Tuesday evening, opening fire at the international terminal in front of security checkpoints and then blowing themselves up.

At least 36 people were killed and another 147 were injured. The German Foreign Ministry said that there is so far no evidence that any Germans were killed in the attack.

The attack has only caused a handful of scheduling changes at Frankfurt Airport: One flight was cancelled on Tuesday evening while on Wednesday, three flights from Istanbul and two flights to Istanbul were also cancelled.

Turkish Prime Minister Binali Yildirim said on Wednesday that initial indications seem to point to Isis being behind the attack.

Air traffic at the airport had resumed by Wednesday morning, but the attack has naturally caused problems for the busy transit hub where more than 340 Turkish Airlines flights were cancelled on Wednesday. The airline is offering passengers going to or from Atatürk airport to re-book or cancel their flights for free. Many were stranded overnight following the attack.

Turkey has experienced a series of bombing attacks recently, linked to Isis or Kurdish militants. The Kurdish nationalist militant group TAK claimed responsibility for an attack earlier this month in central Istanbul which killed 11 people, stating that Turkey was no longer safe for foreign tourists.

That bombing was the third serious attack in the centre of the city since the beginning of the year.

An Isis suicide attack in January near Istanbul’s Blue Mosque killed 12 German tourists.

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