Istanbul Explosion: What We Know So Far

Updated on January 12 at 10:27 a.m.

What we know about the explosion in Istanbul:

—At least 10 people are dead and 15 wounded. Turkish news reports quote the prime minister as telling German Chancellor Angela Merkel that the victims are mostly German. He later said all the victims were foreigners.

—The blast occurred in the historic Sultanahmet district, which is home to the Blue Mosque and is popular with tourists.

—President Recep Tayyip Erdogan says the attack was carried out by a suicide bomber of “Syrian origin.” The deputy prime minister said the bomber was born in 1988. He was later identified as Saudi-born Nabil Fadli. The deputy prime minister said he’d recently entered Turkey from Syria.

Most of the victims of Tuesday’s suicide attack in Istanbul’s historic Sultanahmet district that killed 10 people and wounded 15 others were German, Turkey’s prime minister has told the German Chancellor. Ahmet Davutoglu, the prime minister, later said all the victims were foreigners.

Turkish officials also identified the bomber as Nabil Fadli, who was born in Saudi Arabia. They had earlier identified the attacker as a Syrian born in 1988. It’s unclear if he held dual citizenship, Syrian citizenship, or if Turkish officials had misspoken earlier.

President Recep Tayyip Erdogan said the attacker was of “Syrian origin.” Numan Kurtulmuş, the deputy prime minister, said the bomber was born in 1988. He said the attacker had recently entered Turkey from Syria.

Davutoglu, the Turkish prime minister,