ISTANBUL — A 12-year-old girl became the ninth victim Tuesday of a bomb blast in Turkey’s southeast, which has highlighted fears that Kurdish rebels seeking self-rule are becoming emboldened by moves toward autonomy by the Kurdish minority in war-torn Syria.
Deputy Prime Minister Besir Atalay said that the girl had died of her wounds and that three other children were among those killed when a bomb concealed in a vehicle exploded Monday night near a police station in the city of Gaziantep, near the Syrian border, where tens of thousands of refugees are sheltering in Turkish camps.
Dozens more were wounded in the blast, which occurred on a Muslim holiday and came amid an increase in fighting in recent weeks between Turkish forces and Kurdish rebels who took up arms in 1984.
There was no claim of responsibility, and Firat, a pro-Kurdish news agency, cited militants as saying they were not involved and guerrilla forces would not attack civilians. However, Turkish Interior Minister Idris Naim Sahin said any disavowal by the rebel Kurdistan Workers’ Party, or PKK, was not credible, according to Turkey’s NTV television. Kurdish militants have targeted civilians, and the PKK is deemed a terrorist group by Turkey and its Western allies.
‘‘The fact that the PKK has not claimed the attack does not mean that it didn’t do it,’’ Sahin said during a visit to Gaziantep. ‘‘The attack has links within and outside of Turkey.’’
Turkey has conducted periodic air strikes against Kurdish rebel bases in the mountains of northern Iraq, but is now concerned that the guerrillas are organizing in Kurdish-dominated parts of Syria sympathetic to their cause, and where regime forces have pulled back.
Fighters from a Syrian Kurd group have set up checkpoints and hoisted Kurdish flags in areas near Turkey, and Turkish forces have staged several drills on their side of the border in a show of force.