ISTANBUL, 14 August 2007 — A Turkish passenger ferry and a Ukrainian-flagged cargo ship collided off Turkey’s biggest city Istanbul yesterday, injuring 48 passengers, officials said. “A total of 48 people were injured in the collision,” the Istanbul mayor’s office said in a statement.
It added that one man sustained serious injuries in the accident, while the rest were treated as outpatients. Earlier, the Istanbul health department had put the number of injured at 40.
An investigation was launched to determine the cause of the accident in the Sea of Marmara, the Anatolia news agency said.
The maritime undersecretariat in Ankara said the passenger ferry, operated by a municipality-owned company, had run into the cargo ship, the Semyon Rudhnev, which was anchored at the time.
In Kiev, the Ukrainian Foreign Ministry also said the Turkish ferry was at fault. “According to initial information, the Turkish party is responsible for the accident,” it said in a statement, adding that the ship’s crew did not suffer any injuries.
Ahmet Paksoy, the general director of the municipality-owned company that operates the ferry, told the NTV news channel that none of the injuries were serious. “Most of the people were treated as outpatients and some were taken to hospital,” he said. The maritime undersecretariat in Ankara said in a statement that the passenger ferry had run into the cargo ship, the Semyon Rudhnev, which was anchored at the time.
Suffering only minor damage, it returned to Yenikapi. Authorities immediately dispatched ambulances and fire engines to the site.
Meanwhile, the Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK) yesterday warned Iraq and Turkey against launching any crackdown on the separatist movement after both countries agreed to end its safe haven on the frontier.
“The Iraqi government should not interfere in the conflict between us and Turkey,” spokesman Abdelrahman Chadarchi told AFP by telephone from the Qandil Mountains on the Iraq-Iran border.
“If they plan to strike at the PKK politically or militarily, Iraq and Turkey will pay the price and the crises in Iraq and Turkey will deepen,” he added without elaborating. Chadarchi denied that his party received military aid from either Iraqi Kurds or the United States.
On Aug. 7, Iraqi Prime Minister Nuri Al-Maliki and Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan signed a document of cooperation to end the safe haven that separatist Turkish Kurd rebels enjoy in Kurdish-run northern Iraq.
“We said (in the memorandum of understanding) that we will cooperate against terrorist organizations, notably the PKK,” Maliki said in Ankara.
Turkey has threatened cross-border strikes at PKK bases in neighboring northern Iraq if Baghdad and Washington fail to curb the rebels.
The PKK has stepped up its attacks inside Turkey this year. Ankara says the PKK, which has been fighting for self-rule in Turkey’s mainly Kurdish southeast since 1984, enjoys free movement in northern Iraq, where it obtains weapons and explosives.
