UPDATE - Dozens Of People Injured As Car Bomb Rocks Syria's Afrin - Source

ALEPPO (UrduPoint News / Sputnik - 16th December, 2018) A bomb-laden car has detonated in the center of the northern Syrian city of Afrin, with dozens of people injured, a local Kurdish source told Sputnik on Sunday.

"The car exploded in the area of al-Hal market. According to our data, several dozen people were injured," the source said.

The source added that another car laden with explosives had been found in the west of the city.

Lebanon's Al Mayadeen tv channel, meanwhile, reported, citing its own source, that five people had been killed as a result of the blast in Afrin.

Reizan Hedu, a Kurdish politician, told Sputnik later in the day that militants supported by the Turkish authorities were behind the attack.

"Explosions at markets and streets of the city are organized by terrorists.

The responsibility lies with the Turkish army and groups allied with it," Hedu said.

He noted that this kind of terror attacks came as result of attempts by various groups to divide spheres of influence among each other.

On January 20, Ankara, jointly with the opposition Free Syrian Army forces, launched Operation Olive Branch in Afrin in order to "clear" Turkey's Syrian border from the terrorist threat. Turkey considers the the Democratic Union Party (PYD), a Kurdish political party in northern Syria, and the Kurdish People's Protection Units (YPG) militia to be linked to the Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK), listed as a terrorist organization by Ankara.

Damascus has condemned the operation as a violation of Syria's sovereignty.