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One person was killed during an attack on a church in Istanbul’s Sarıyer district during a service on Sunday, Interior Minister Ali Yerlikaya said, adding that “large-scale investigation into the issue and efforts to catch the attackers have been initiated.”
“Today around 11.40 a.m. during the service at the Santa Maria Church in Sarıyer’s Büyükdere neighborhood, C.T. among those attending the ritual was attacked with a gun by two masked people and unfortunately lost their life,” Yerlikaya said in a post on his official social media account on X, formerly Twitter.
“A large-scale investigation into the issue and efforts to catch the attackers have been initiated,” he added.
“We strongly condemn this vile attack,” the minister said.
Footage from the church showed a number of police cars and an ambulance dispatched outside the building.
Other officials, including Vice President Cevdet Yılmaz, Justice Minister Yılmaz Tunç and Justice and Development Party (AK Party) spokesperson Ömer Çelik condemned the attack on the Italian church.
“We condemn in the strongest terms the armed attack on a person during the service at the Santa Maria Church in Sarıyer, Istanbul, and express our condolences to the family of the person who lost their life,” Yılmaz said in a statement on his social media account.
“Our security forces are conducting a large-scale investigation to shed light on the incident and hold the perpetrators accountable to justice,” he said.
The motive for the attack was also not immediately clear.
“Our security forces are conducting a large-scale investigation into the matter,” Çelik said in a written statement on X.
“Those who threaten the peace and security of our citizens will never achieve their goals,” he added.
Tunç meanwhile stated that a deputy chief prosecutor and two public prosecutors were assigned to shed light on the armed attack, while strongly condemning the incident.
“An investigation has been launched by the Istanbul Chief Public Prosecutor’s Office regarding the attack in which one person lost their life, and a deputy chief prosecutor and two public prosecutors have been assigned to shed light on the incident. Efforts are continuing to identify and capture the suspects who carried out the attack. The investigation is being carried out in a multifaceted and meticulous manner,” Tunç said in a post on X.
