Thirty-nine people, including many foreigners, were killed on Sunday when a gunman went on a rampage at an exclusive nightclub in Istanbul where revellers were celebrating the New Year.
As police launched a dragnet for the assailant, President Recep Tayyip Erdogan said the carnage sought to sow chaos and undermine peace, but Turkey would never bow to the threat.
The shooting spree at the waterside Reina nightclub was unleashed when 2017 in Turkey was just 75 minutes old, after a year of unprecedented bloodshed that saw hundreds of people die in strikes blamed on Kurdish militants and jihadists and a bloody failed coup. The assailant shot dead a policeman and a civilian at the club entrance and then went on the rampage inside where up to 700 people were ringing in the New Year.
Interior Minister Suleyman Soylu said the attacker had escaped and was now the target of a major manhunt. He added that of 20 victims identified so far, 15 were foreigners.
Published 01 January 2017, 19:27 IST