Turkish leader urges calm

Authorities arrested nine Turks with alleged ties to the Syrian government groups for the twin car bombings that killed scores in Reyhanli on Saturday. Syria has denied any involvement.

"They want to drag us down a vile path," Recep Tayyip Erdogan said on Sunday as he urged people to remain "level-headed in the face of each provocation aimed at drawing Turkey into the Syrian quagmire."

The blasts killed 46 people. Authorities have so far identified 35 of the dead, three of them as Syrians.

‘Provocations'

Turkish Deputy Prime Minister Besir Atalay said the attack aimed to create anger against Syrian refugees. Hundreds marched Sunday in Antakya, near Reyhanli, protesting Turkey's support for the Syrian rebels.

Witnesses also said Turks attacked Syrian-registered cars in Reyhanli soon after Saturday's bombings. Some Syrians avoided leaving their homes. Erdogan asked citizens in Reyhanli to remain calm and not to "fall for the provocations."

The regime of Syrian President Bashar al-Assad denied the allegations: "Syria didn't and will never undertake such acts because our values don't allow us to do this," Information Minister Omran al-Zoubi had said earlier Sunday in Damascus.

Al-Zoubi also branded Erdogan a "killer and a butcher," adding that the prime minister "has no right to build his glory on the blood of the Turkish and Syrian people."

Crossing borders

Syria's civil war, which has already left more than 80,000 people dead and hundreds of thousands homeless since it started in March 2011, has increasingly spilled over the country's borders.

In recent weeks, Israel has reportedly bombed the country twice over weapons shipments, Lebanon's Hezbollah has admitted to fighting alongside troops loyal to Syria's President Bashar al-Assad.

Jordan has warned that Syrians could soon make up 40 percent of its population.

Last fall, shells fired from Syria killed five people in Turkey, prompting Germany, the Netherlands and the US to send Patriot air defense missiles to protect their NATO ally.

Turkish Foreign Minister Ahmet Davutoglu said that his country had no immediate plans to involve NATO this time around. "The latest attack shows how a spark transforms into a fire when the international community remains silent and the UN Security Council fails to act," Davutoglu said.

German Defense Minister Thomas de Maiziere argued, however, that there were only "limited" options available to the international community.

"A military intervention would be very, very costly and would result in significant losses," Maiziere said in an interview on German public television.

mkg/jm (AFP, AP)