MONDAY was a day of terror spread across three countries with attacks occurring in Turkey, Germany and Switzerland.

    The Russian ambassador to Turkey was shot in the back and killed as he gave a speech at an Ankara art gallery Monday by an off-duty police officer who shouted “Don’t forget Aleppo” and “Allahu Akbar” as he opened fire.

    The Russian Foreign Ministry said the killing of envoy Andrei Karlov was a “terrorist act.”

    The Ankara mayor said the killer, Mevlut Mert Altintas, was a 22-year-old police officer, who was not on duty at the time. He was later killed in a shootout with police.

    It was not clear whether the gunman was a lone operator, driven perhaps by popular discontent over Russian action in Syria or affiliated to a group like Islamic State, which carried out a string of bomb attacks in Turkey last year.

    Turkish police have detained the attacker’s mother, father, sister, two other relatives, and flatmate in Ankara.

    The United States closed its three missions in Turkey yesterday after a gun was fired in front of the U.S. embassy in Ankara overnight. The embassy was near the art gallery where Karlov was shot and Turkish police detained a man over the incident, state media reported.

    Turkey faces multiple security threats, including from the Islamic State militant group. A spokesman for the hardline Sunni Muslim group urged sympathizers around the world this month to carry out a fresh wave of attacks, singling out Turkish diplomatic, military and financial interests as preferred targets.

    However, a senior Turkish security official said there were “very strong signs” the gunman belonged to the network of the U.S.-based cleric Fethullah Gulen, who Ankara says orchestrated a failed coup in July. Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan has denounced Gulen as a terrorist, but the cleric denies any role in the assassination.

    In addition to the incident, Berlin police are investigating a “presumed terrorist attack” after at least 12 people were killed and about 50 injured when a truck ploughed into a Christmas market in the city Monday evening.

    They are interrogating a suspect — thought to be the driver — who was arrested 2 km from the scene and are working on the assumption the truck was deliberately driven into the busy market in Breitscheidplatz. The truck had a runup of about 80 meters before crashing into market stalls and shoppers outside Kaiser Wilhelm memorial church, at 8 p.m.

    The crash came less than a month after the U.S. State Department called for caution in markets and other public places across Europe, saying extremist groups including Islamic State and al-Qaida were focusing “on the upcoming holiday season and associated events.”

    In Switzerland, a man stormed into a Zurich mosque Monday evening and opened fire on people praying, injuring three.

    Police discovered a body in the vicinity that is believed to be that of the assailant. The motive was unknown, but authorities were not considering it as terrorism.

    (SD-Agencies)

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