ISIL militants prepared suicide vests in Gaziantep on Syrian border: Police

Turkish counter-terrorism units have revealed that militants of the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL) prepared suicide bomb vests and other materials in a depot in the southeastern province of Gaziantep for use in the double suicide bomb attack that killed 102 people in Ankara on Oct. 10.

After Turkish police seized 33 suicide bomb vests during operations in Gaziantep and Kilis in 2014, ISIL militants started preparing the vests from scratch in a depot, instead of bringing them over from Syria.

Police surveillance conducted after the Oct. 10 attack in Ankara, which revealed the cell houses of ISIL militants, prevented further attacks planned by the group such as suicide bomb attacks against a gathering in Gaziantep due to be attended by Peoples' Democratic Party (HDP) co-chair Figen Yüksekda?, a HDP rally in Istanbul, and the G-20 Summit in Antalya. 

Police determined that the perpetrators of the Oct. 10 attack - Yunus Emre Alagöz and a second unidentified attacker - were linked to a cell house in Gaziantep. The police uncovered cell houses and stores after following driver Halil ?brahim Durgun, who brought the suicide bombers from Gaziantep to Ankara. 

Since police seized 33 suicide vests in Gaziantep and Kilis in 2014, plotters are thought to have preferred to produce attack materials themselves rather than bringing them over from Syria. 

They also purchased standard market hair dye to use during bomb-making, in order to not attract attention while purchasing hydrogen peroxide.

Police determined that ISIL had decided to conduct attacks and to send suicide bombers into Kilis over the border either one day before or on the day of the attacks in Ankara. They were taken to cell houses and given...