Deadly rocket fire from Syria in Turkish border town

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One person was killed and 26 others injured on Sunday in the Turkish border town of Kilis after rockets were fired from a region of Syria controlled by so-called Islamic State.

Houses and a mosque were hit in two separate rocket attacks during the day.

Turkish soldiers near the border returned fire into Syria, security sources said.

16 wounded as two rocket projectiles fired from Syria land in Turkey’s Kilis https://t.co/Q88WsTzKR5 pic.twitter.com/P3l7BLSIx0

— Hürriyet Daily News (@HDNER) 24 avril 2016

Kilis, just across the border from Syria, is housing an estimated 110,000 Syrian refugees. Some of Sunday’s casualties were Syrians.

Yet such bloodshed is nothing new. Rocket fire has become a near daily hazard, killing 16 people in the border province since January according to Turkish media.

A Kilis shopkeeper, who has experienced it first hand, talked to Euronews.

“I was sitting in front of my store,” he said.

“Suddenly there was smoke and a missile hit the building and exploded.”

Fear has gripped the population.

Another man told Euronews: “We jump every time a door slams in the house. We are all nervous in Kilis. We don’t feel our lives are safe.”

After the latest bloodshed, some called for local officials to resign and slammed the government which has promised to protect the area from repeated attacks by ISIL.

“I cannot sleep, my son wakes up with nightmares, he cannot sleep. We aren’t safe here. We are afraid to stay in our houses,” Ayse, a 46-year-old woman, told Reuters.

Prime Minister Ahmet Davutoglu has pledged that all necessary measures would be taken to prevent more rocket fire into Kilis.

On Saturday he visited the nearby city of Gaziantep, about 55 km away, together with German Chancellor Angela Merkel and European Council President Donald Tusk.

Merkel had been expected to visit Kilis last weekend but the location and timing of the visit were changed.