Turkish Anti-terror Police Shot Dead Russia's Ambassador

The violence of Syria’s bloody civil war has had a shocking repercussion beyond its borders with the assassination of Russia’s ambassador to Turkey in Ankara in what appeared to be revenge for his country’s part in the assault on Aleppo. 

Andrey Karlov was killed at an art gallery in Ankara by a gunman who shot him eight times at close range. Standing over the 62-year-old diplomat’s body the assassin, wearing a black suit and tie, was heard shouting “Don’t forget Aleppo, don’t forget Syria. Unless our towns are secure, you won’t enjoy security. Everyone who is involved in this will pay a price. Only death can take me from here.” 

Film footage taken at the scene showed the killer repeatedly gesticulating with a pistol in his hand. There had been heavy security around Mr Karlov’s presence at the art gallery, but, according to one of the guards, the gunman had entered by showing a police ID card and saying that he was an officer in the public order department.

Altintas, 22, was a member of the riot police in Ankara, which enabled him to enter the building through the use of his police ID card, according to Interior Ministry sources.

Burhan Ozbilici, a photographer for The Associated Press, witnessed the shooting, and wrote an account of it for the agency.

"The event was routine enough -- the opening of an exhibit of photographs of Russia — and when a man on stage pulled out a gun I thought it was a theatrical flourish," Ozbilici wrote about the incident. "It was anything but. Moments later the Russian ambassador was sprawled on the floor and the attacker was waving his gun at the rest of us, shouting slogans."

Altintas was ultimately killed by the Turkish anti-terror police, the Interior Ministry said. The ambassador was already dead by the time he arrived at the hospital, they added.

Three other people were injured during the incident but are said to be recovering.

Altintas' mother and sister were taken into custody in the city of Izmir after the shooting.

Mr Putin, who said he personally knew the murdered envoy, said he had agreed in a phone call with his Turkish counterpart that Russian investigators would soon fly to Ankara to help the Turks with the investigation.

"We must know who directed the killer's hand," Mr Putin told Mr Lavrov, Sergei Naryshkin, the head of his SVR foreign intelligence service, and Alexander Bortnikov, the head of the domestic FSB security service.

Mr Putin ordered security at Turkish diplomatic facilities in Russia to be stepped up and said he wanted guarantees from Turkey about the safety of Russian diplomatic facilities.

"I also ask you to implement the agreed proposals on strengthening security at Russian diplomatic facilities abroad," Mr Putin told the meeting.

The killing came a day before the Turkish foreign minister, Mevlut Cavusoglu, was due in Moscow to meet Russian and Iranian ministers to discuss the war in Syria. 

There was trepidation over what may now follow the killing. Fatih Oke, a senior Turkish diplomat in Washington wrote on twitter “The bullet to Ambassador Karlov is not only aimed at him, it aims also at Turkey’s relations with Russia”.  

Speaking outside the hospital where Mr Karlov was taken after the attack, Melih Gokcek, the mayor of Ankara, echoed this, saying “this was done to ruin what is between us and Russia”. 

A Turkish security official told Reuters that Ankara saw "very strong signs" the gunman who killed Russia's ambassador there on Monday was a follower of a US-based Muslim cleric blamed for orchestrating a failed coup by sections of the military in July.

A representative of cleric Fethullah Gulen, Alp Aslandogan, denied any link and said the exiled cleric condemned the murder as a "heinous act".

The Turkish official, who declined to be identified, said the current investigation was focused on the gunman's links to the network of Gulen's followers, which the government calls the "Gulenist Terrorist Organisation" or "FETO".

There was swift condemnation of the murder from the West. US State Department spokesman John Kirby said: “We condemn this act of violence, whatever its source. Our thoughts and prayers are with him and his family.” In London, Foreign Secretary Boris Johnson said he was “shocked to hear of the despicable murder of Russia’s ambassador to Turkey. I condemn this cowardly attack".

Mr Karlov may not have been just a target of opportunity for those trying to lash out at Moscow over its role in the Syrian conflict. He had been extensively involved in Syrian affairs, playing a key role in the negotiations between Turkey and Russia which led to the evacuation of civilians and rebels from eastern Aleppo after the opposition held part of the city was overrun by the forces of Bashar al-Assad. The ambassador had also, it was said, played a part in convincing the Iranians, supporters of the regime with militia fighters present on the ground in Aleppo, to accept the deal.

He also served as ambassador to both North and South Korea for a prolonged period before arriving in Ankara and was widely respected in the international diplomatic circuit.

Russia and Turkey had been locked in a confrontation after the shooting down of a Russian warplane by the Turks last year. But relations thawed after an apology from President Erdogan, and the two countries have been cooperating on Syria, something Mr Karlov had also helped engineer.