Turkey believes the gunman who killed 39 people in an attack on new year revellers in an Istanbul nightclub is an ethnic Uighur, a senior government official has said.

Veysi Kaynak, one of several deputy prime ministers, told the broadcaster A Haber that Turkey had established his possible locations and links, hours after police carried out a dawn raid in a town on the edge of Istanbul and detained several suspects.

He said he could not rule out the possibility that the attacker, who remains at large, had fled abroad, but that operations within Turkey were more likely to achieve a result.



“The terrorist’s identity has been established by security forces and his potential whereabouts have also been determined,” Kaynak said, describing the man as a “specially trained” member of a cell who carried out the attack alone.

Turkey’s foreign minister said on Wednesday that the gunman had been identified but provided no further details. Turkish media had reported he was believed to be an ethnic Uighur from central Asia, possibly Kyrgyzstan.

Uighurs, a largely Muslim, Turkic-speaking minority in far western China with significant diaspora communities across central Asia and Turkey, were among those detained on Thursday in Selimpaşa, a coastal town just to the west of Istanbul. Turkish news agencies said investigators had received intelligence that individuals who may have helped the gunman were there.

It was not immediately clear how many people were detained on Thursday, but at least 36 people have been held since the attack, according to earlier media reports.

Islamic State claimed responsibility for the attack, saying it was revenge for Turkish military involvement in Syria.

The suspect, who authorities have not named, shot his way into exclusive Istanbul nightclub Reina early on Sunday and opened fire with an automatic rifle, throwing stun grenades to allow himself to reload and shooting the wounded on the ground.

In the confusion, several early witness reports said there may have been more than one attacker, something the Turkish authorities have largely ruled out.

“There was only one shooter. The act was carried out with one gun … but there could have been helpers inside,” Kaynak said, noting that investigators were still examining whether he had a lookout or other accomplices inside the club.

Police in the Aegean coastal city of Izmir on Wednesday detained what they said were 20 suspected Isis militants thought to be of central Asian and north African origin. Fake passports, mobile phones, and equipment including night vision goggles and a GPS device were seized.

