At least 27 killed in Turkish border town explosion

SURUC, Turkey, July 20 (UPI) -- At least 27 were killed in an explosion at a meeting of youth workers at a Suruc, Turkey, cultural center, the Turkish interior Ministry reported Monday.

Hundreds of others were injured in the blast in the garden of the Amara Cultural Center, where about 300 members of the Federation of Socialist Youth Organizations (Sosyalist Gençlik) were meeting. The town, on the border with Syria, is the temporary home of about 20,000 refugees who have fled sectarian and anti-government violence in the nearby city of Kobane, Syria.

Witnesses said those attacked were volunteers who came to Suruc to involve themselves in relief work. Authorities suspect a suicide bomber, although there has been no official response or explanation.

Another explosion occurred in Kobane, with conflicting reports regarding its cause. The Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights suggested a car bomb exploded as the vehicle arrived at a checkpoint manned by the Turkish YPG militia, but a YPG spokesman said it was merely the detonation of explosives left by the Islamic State during a clearing operation.

The Kobane area has been the site of battles between IS and Kurdish forces since September 2014; most residents have since fled to Turkey.