Russian ambassador to Turkey assassinated

ERBIL, Kurdistan Region (Kurdistan24) - Andrey Gennadiyevich Karlov Russia's ambassador to Turkey was shot and heavily wounded in an assassination attempt by an unknown assailant on Monday night in Ankara.

Russian RIA news agency said the ambassador died at a hospital he was taken.

The ambassador was targeted with four or five shots from behind while visiting an art gallery in the Turkish capital, said Hurriyet newspaper.

The assailant who allegedly showed a police ID to enter the gallery shouted Islamic slogans at the scene.

One of the newspaper's reporters who was at the gallery told CNN Turk TV that Karlov was shot several times by a man they thought was a bodyguard.

"He first shot in the air then aimed at the ambassador as the visitors tried to take cover on the floor. I took some pictures there. Then he told everyone to get out," said the reporter.

"We are dying in Syria. So you will die here. You will not get alive out of here. We kill the murderers like this," the attacker allegedly shouted at Karlov at the gallery right across the United States Embassy.

Karlov, heavily wounded, was taken to a hospital after the attack, as ambulances rushed to the scene. There was no confirmation of his death by Turkish authorities at the time of publishing this article.

An eyewitness told the TV she heard the assailant speaking in Turkish and talking about Aleppo where a UN-brokered deal to evacuate civilians and fighters in the last rebel-held eastern districts besieged by the Russian-backed Syrian regime was implemented.

After the visitors fled, and with the arrival of police, a clash erupted between them and the assailant.

The incident which happened around 7 PM in Turkey time, ended about an hour later as the assailant was killed, according to the government-run Anadolu Agency.

The assassination attempt on the life of the Russian ambassador follows a summer reconciliation between Turkey's President Recep Tayyip Erdogan and his counterpart Vladimir Putin.

Relations between the two sides deteriorated a year ago when Turkish pilots brought down a Russian warplane on the border with Syria.

Editing by Ava Homa