‘10 more arrested over Ankara attack’

ISTANBUL — Turkish Prime Minister Ahmet Davutoglu on Thursday said 10 more people had been arrested over the Ankara attack that killed 99 and for tweets that allegedly showed prior knowledge of the blasts.

The Turkish government is making a heavy emphasis on tweets posted hours before Saturday's attack on a peace rally that apparently predicted the double suicide bombing.

Officials have sought to link the suspect account to the outlawed Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK). But the government has also said the prime suspect in the attacks is the Daesh terror group which is bitterly opposed to the PKK.

Davutoglu told TGRT news channel in an interview that Turkey was probing the involvement of both the PKK and Daesh in the blasts.

"As a first track, we have started to untangle this web of relations, with the Deash factor being focused on as the prime suspect," he said.

"The second track are the tweets: some actors carried out preliminary work as preparation before the bombing."

"Yesterday and today [Thursday] there have been ten additional arrests by following both tracks. The investigation continues and is getting deeper," he added.

"Among those detained are people linked to the PKK and linked to Deash," he added.

The Turkish government has said that two people with alleged links to the PKK had already been detained over the tweets which it said were posted nine hours before the attack.

In the worst attack in modern Turkey's history, two suicide bombers blew themselves up in a crowd of peace activists in Ankara.

Turkish media reports said the two bombers have been identified as Yunus Emre Alagoz, the brother of the man who carried out a similar attack in the town of Suruc in July killing 34, and Omer Deniz Dundar who had twice been to Syria in recent times.

The reports have linked the pair to Daesh.

In the interview however Davutoglu did not mention the names of the bombers and Ankara prosecutors have also banned publication of materials relating to the investigation.