Rockets strike Turkish school near Syria border

Rockets have struck a school in Kilis, a city in southern Turkey near the Syrian border, killing at least one female staff member and injuring several others, including a pupil.

Police were investigating Monday’s explosion, which government officials blamed on rockets fired from across the border in Syria.

Al Jazeera’s Andrew Simmons, reporting from the scene in Kilis, said: “One female staff member has died, and a female student in her teens has been critically injured and is in the hospital being treated. Two other people have been injured.

“This was a rocket attack and not a long-range mortar as some have been reporting.”

Turkish authorities identified the school as Eyup Gokce Imam Middle School.

The semi-official Anadolu news agency said the woman who was killed was a school janitor, adding that another three people wounded in the attack were being treated at the Kilis State Hospital.

Our correspondent quoted local officials as saying the rocket was fired from Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL) positions “less than 20km away from the Syrian border.

“There have been previous attacks along the border, but not anything like this,” he said.

“It is still unclear if the attack was an accident or on purpose.”

Istanbul attack

Last week a suicide bomber blew himself up among groups of tourists in the historic centre of Istanbul, killing at least 12 people, including 10 Germans. 

Ahmet Davutoglu, Turkey’s prime minister, said on Wednesday that the attacker was an ISIL member who had entered Turkey from Syria as a refugee.

ISIL has not claimed responsibility for the attack.

Davutoglu also said the Turkish army had fired at least 500 times on ISIL targets in Syria and Iraq following the Istanbul attack, killing about 200 fighters.

Turkey has become a target for ISIL, with two bombings last year blamed on the armed group, in the town of Suruc near the Syrian border and in the capital Ankara.

The second blast killed more than 100 people.