Bombers 'planned hostage-taking'

The suicide attackers who launched the deadly Istanbul airport assault were planning to take dozens of passengers hostage, Turkish media reported yesterday, as two of the bombers were identified.

Turkish officials have pointed blame at the Islamic State jihadist group for Tuesday night's gun and bomb spree at Ataturk airport, which left 44 people dead including 19 foreigners.

"They say they are doing this in the name of Islam," President Recep Tayyip Erdogan said on a visit to Istanbul.

"That has nothing to do with Islam. Their place is in hell," he added.

State-run news agency Anadolu said 11 more people had been detained in Istanbul in a string of raids over the attack yesterday. The arrests by counter-terror police in the European side of Istanbul brought to 24 the number of people detained in the investigation. 

Citing a prosecution source, the agency named two of the attackers as Rakim Bulgarov and Vadim Osmanov, without giving their nationalities.

Officials had previously said the three bombers were a Russian, an Uzbek and a Kyrgyz national.

Turkish media identified the strike's organiser as Akhmed Chatayev, the Chechen leader of an IS cell in Istanbul who reportedly found accommodation for the bombers.

Chatayev allegedly organised two deadly bombings this year in the heart of the city's Sultanahmet tourist district and the busy Istiklal shopping street, the Hurriyet newspaper said.

Michael McCaul, chairman of the US House Committee on Homeland Security, described Chatayev as "probably the number one enemy in the Northern Caucasus region of Russia".

"He's travelled to Syria on many occasions and became one of the top lieutenants for the minister of war for ISIS operations," McCaul told CNN.

Swedish court documents seen by AFP showed the 36-year-old had been sentenced to 16 months in jail there in 2008 for arms trafficking, after which he would be deported.

He had been granted political asylum in Austria in 2003.