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 The bomber, an Islamic State member thought to have come recently
from Syria, blew himself up on Tuesday in Sultanahmet square near
the Blue Mosque and Hagia Sophia, major tourist sites in one of the
world's most visited cities.
Asked about a report in the Turkish media that the bomber had
registered at an immigration office in Istanbul a week ago, Interior
Minister Efkan Ala confirmed that the man's fingerprints were on
record with the Turkish authorities.
"Your assessment that his fingerprints were taken and there is a
record of him is correct. But he was not on the wanted individuals
list. And neither is he on the target individuals list sent to us by
other countries," Ala told a joint news conference with his German
counterpart Thomas de Maiziere.
Turkey’s Haberturk newspaper published what it said was a CCTV image
of the bomber, identified in some local media reports as Saudi-born
Nabil Fadli, at an immigration office in Istanbul on Jan. 5.
It said he was identified by a sample of a finger taken from the
blast site.
 Deputy Prime Minister Numan Kurtulmus said on Tuesday the bomber had
been identified from body parts at the scene, was born in 1988, and
thought to have been living in Syrian, from where he was believed to
have recently entered Turkey.
Turkey, which like Germany is a member of the U.S.-led coalition
against Islamic State in Syria and Iraq, has become a target for the
radical Sunni militants.
It was hit by two major bombings last year blamed on the group, in
the largely Kurdish town of Suruc near the Syrian border and in the
capital Ankara, the latter killing more than 100 people at a
pro-Kurdish rally in the worst attack of its kind on Turkish soil.
The Istanbul attack, targeting groups of tourists as they wandered
around the square, appeared to mark a change in Islamic State's
tactics against Turkey.
"This incident is a bit different. In previous attacks, it was Turks
who crossed into Syria to fight Kurds and then crossed back to
attack Kurdish targets," said Aaron Stein, senior fellow at Atlantic
Council’s Rafik Hariri Center for the Middle East.
"It’s different in terms of intentions and in terms of its targets,"
he told Reuters.
GERMANS NOT DELIBERATE TARGET
Foreign tourists and Turks paid their respects at the site early on
Wednesday. Scarves with the Bayern Munich soccer club emblem were
left along with carnations and roses at the scene, before Turkish
police sealed off the area.
De Maiziere said there were no indications Germans had been
deliberately targeted and that he saw no reason for people to change
travel plans to Turkey. He said Germany stood resolutely by Turkey's
side in the fight against terrorism.
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"If the terrorists aimed to disturb, destroy or jeopardize
cooperation between partners, they achieved the opposite. Germany
and Turkey are becoming even closer," he said.
"Based on what we know from the investigation so far, there are no
indications that the attack was explicitly targeting Germans so
there cannot be a link with our contribution to the fight against
international terrorism," he said.
Ala said nine other Germans were wounded in the blast, two of them
still in a serious condition in hospital, along with one Norwegian
and one Peruvian. He vowed to work closely with Germany in
investigating the attack.
One person was detained late on Tuesday as part of the investigation
into the blast, Ala said, but gave no details. He defended Turkey's
record in fighting Islamic State, saying 200 suspects had been
detained just a week before the blast.
He said Turkey had detained 3,318 people over suspected links to
Islamic State and other radical groups since Syria's conflict began,
847 of whom, most of them foreigners, had subsequently been
arrested.
Turkish media reports said on Wednesday the authorities had detained
three Russian nationals as part of the crackdown on Islamic State,
but it was not immediately clear whether the move was part of the
investigation into the Istanbul attack, for which there has been no
claim of responsibility.
Russia's Consulate General in the Mediterranean city of Antalya said
three Russians had been detained over suspected connection to
Islamic State, Russian state news agency RIA said.
Police seized documents and CDs in a search of the premises where
they were staying, Turkey's Dogan News Agency said.
(Additional reporting by Orhan Coskun in Ankara, Michelle Martin in
Berlin; Writing by Nick Tattersall; Editing by Giles Elgood)
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