A Blast, a Warning, And a Curious Child Is Killed in Istanbul

Father Recalls Sunday's Twin Bombing

ISTANBUL, July 29 -- After the first explosion, Seyma Ozkan rushed from her bedroom to the apartment balcony, her father said. Things don't often blow up in Gungoren, a working-class district near Istanbul's main airport.

Her mother and father soon joined the curious 12-year-old. They watched from the fourth floor as wounded, startled neighbors ran from the blast site. Suddenly, Aydin Ozkan began urging his wife and daughter to go back inside.

"There's going to be another explosion," Ozkan told them, but his warning came too late. A second, more powerful bomb detonated on the crowded street, sending a piece of shrapnel flying toward them.

Ozkan, 52, in an interview Tuesday, recounted what happened next in a monotone, a cigarette between his fingers: The fragment pierced Seyma's heart, killing her almost instantly.

The Sunday evening attack, the deadliest in Turkey since 2004, killed 17 people, wounded nearly 150 and further unsettled a country already on edge. Turks are grimly watching the progress of two legal cases that illustrate the perilous rift between secular Turks and the Islamic-rooted Justice and Development Party, which broadened its mandate in elections last year.

On Monday, Turkey's chief prosecutor told the country's top court that the ruling party should be disbanded and many of its members, including the prime minister, should lose their seats in parliament. Chief Prosecutor Abdurrahman Yalcinkaya argued that Justice and Development had injected Islam into policymaking in violation of the constitution.

If seven of the high court's 11 jurists agree, Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan will have to step down.

Party leaders, whose popularity has been boosted by a growing economy and their determination to win Turkey's membership in the European Union, say they are not trying to turn Turkey into an Islamic state.

In a separate case, Turkish prosecutors filed charges this month against 86 people, including former military officers, accusing them of planning to overthrow the government. In the past, military leaders have forcibly removed from power governments they judged too Islamic.

On Tuesday afternoon, made unseasonably cool by a morning rain shower, Turks on Gungoren's Menderes Street were quick to link Sunday's bombings to the political crisis.

Zeliha Oner, 56, a secularist, got into two screaming matches with women wearing Islamic head scarves in the span of 10 minutes. She said her finances have suffered since Justice and Development took office and accused its leaders of silencing critics.

"I blame the government," she said. "We don't have security."