ISTANBUL, July 28: Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan implicitly blamed separatist Kurdish rebels Monday for two bomb blasts that ripped through a crowded Istanbul street, killing 17 people and wounding more than 150.

The attack on Sunday night further raised tensions hours before the Constitutional Court met to decide the fate of Erdogan’s Islamist-rooted Justice and Development Party, facing closure on charges of undermining Turkey’s secular system.

Erdogan all but named the outlawed Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK), describing the two explosions as “the cost” of an intensified crackdown against the rebels in Turkey and in neighbouring northern Iraq, where they take refuge.

“Unfortunately, the cost of this (military action) is heavy. The incident last night was one such example,” Erdogan said at the scene of the blasts as residents chanted, “Down with the PKK.” The explosions were the deadliest attack against civilians in Turkey since 2003, when 63 people were killed in four suicide bombings in Istanbul blamed on Al Qaeda.

Both bombs were planted in concrete rubbish containers on a crowded pedestrian street lined with shops and cafes in the popular Gungoren neighbourhood on Istanbul’s European side.

A small device went off first at around 10:00 pm (1900 GMT) on Sunday, creating the initial panic, officials said.

A second, more powerful explosion followed about 10 minutes later about 50 metres away as passers-by and residents milled around the site of the first blast.

Istanbul Governor Muammer Guler put the death toll at 17, five of them children, and warned it could rise with six people in critical condition.

The second bomb claimed all the lives, including that of a 12-year-old girl hit by a piece of shrapnel as she stood watching from her fourth-storey balcony, the Anatolia news agency reported.

There were scenes of panic with people covered in blood fleeing the area littered with debris and shattered glass.

Asked whether the PKK was responsible, Guler said “a link is seen with the separatist organisation” and police are working on it, Anatolia reported.

But a senior Kurdish militant denied any PKK involvement.

“The Kurdish liberation movement is not involved in this attack,” Zubeyir Aydar told the pro-PKK Firat news agency.

He said the attack was the work of “sinister forces” and timed to coincide with the AKP trial and a pending case against the shadowy “Ergenekon” nationalist group alleged to have organised attacks and plotted assassinations to create chaos and prompt a military coup against Erdogan’s government.

The international community, including the European Union and Nato, condemned the bombings.

The United States, which has backed Turkish strikes in Iraq by supplying intelligence on PKK movements, pledged continued support for its Nato ally.

“We stand with the people of Turkey as they confront terrorism,” said National Security Council spokesman Gordon Johndroe. “We will continue to partner with them to deal with this problem.” The most recent Turkish raid in northern Iraq was on Sunday morning when fighter jets bombed PKK camps in the Qandil mountains, a major rebel stronghold.

Erdogan pledged that the perpetrators would be caught and punished.

“Those responsible for this savagery, wherever they are, will not escape the end that awaits them,” he said. “The strongest response our nation will give to this attack... will be to strengthen our unity.” At about the same time as the Istanbul attack, a Kurdish militant hurled a hand grenade at a police station in Bingol, in Turkey’s mainly Kurdish southeast, before being shot dead, officials said.—AFP