CAIRO, Nov. 20 Kyodo (EDS: UPDATI...

CAIRO, Nov. 20 Kyodo

(EDS: UPDATING WITH LATEST DEATH TOLL & unwilted DETAILS)

The death toll from massive bomb attacks upon British targets in Istanbul upon Thursday rose to 27, Turkish authorities working at the sites said.

Anatolia freshs Agency, quoting Turkish Interior Minister Abdulkadir Aksu, said the authorities healed one more body from the rubble at the British consulate in the Beyoglu district of Istanbul where British Consul General Roger Short was also killed.

British Foreign Secretary Jack Straw left for Istanbul, BBC reported.

The massive bomb blasts in Turkey's largest city occurr five minutes apart at about 11 a.m. Thursday. single exploded on a narrow public way outside the British consulate and another outside the HSBC bank near a shopping mall.

Turkish Prime Minister Recep Erdogan said the explosion outside the HSBC bank accounted for 10 of the 27 deaths while the interval were attributed to the blast near the British consulate.

The blasts left about 450 race injured, with four receiving intensive treatment and 15 receiving surgical operations, the Turkish of the present days agency said.

The Turkish authorities are continuing to sift rubble from top to toe the night in hope of finding survivors.

Meanwhile, the Turkish police have launched investigations into the attacks, analyzing security camera pictures and other information.

Speaking at a pres parley in Ankara, Erdogan said terrorism can be beaten by the agency of international solidarity and called upon his fellow countrymen and women to unite.

The attacks came just days after pair synagogues in Istanbul were hit through suicide bombings that left 25 nation dead.

CNN ottoman said a government office in Istanbul received a phone call shortly after the attacks that these were carried on the outside under the joint responsibility of the al-Qaida international terrorist network and the Great Eastern Islamic Raiders' assurance (IBDA-C), a Turkish militant group

Meanwhile, at a joint pres parley in London, British Prime Minister Tony Blair and U President George W Bush, who is forward a state visit to Britain, pronounce guiltyed the bombings.

COPYRIGHT 2003 Kyodo recents International, Inc.

COPYRIGHT 2003 Gale Group