Who Is Mert Altintas? Shooter Of Russian Ambassador Identified As Turkey Police Officer

The gunman who shot and killed Russia’s ambassador to Turkey on Monday has been named as an off-duty Turkey police officer. Mert Altintas, who was identified by an Egyptian journalist via a tweet, opened fire on Andrei Karlov while the ambassador was giving a speech at the opening photography exhibition. The shooting was captured live on Turkish television.

Gunfire continued for a while, according to Reuters. Other reports and photos posted to Twitter show Altintas to be bloodied and dead from gunshot wounds.

Altintas is reportedly a police officer and reports suggested he allegedly committed the attack in the name of Syria, Turkey’s civil war-torn neighbor caught between the U.S., Russia and ISIS.

However, Reuters was also reporting that Ankara’s mayor believes Altintas motives had more to do with his following of Turkish preacher and former imam Muhammet Fethullah Gulen and not Syria.

Gulen, who Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan blamed for the attempted coup in his country this summer, has lived in exile for the last 17 years in the U.S. The Turkish government has said he and his followers are terrorists.

In a recent interview with “60 Minutes,” Erdogan said he wants Gulen to be sent back to Turkey.

“This man is the leader of a terrorist organization that has bombed my parliament,” Erdoğan said. “We have extradited terrorists to the United States in the past, and we expect the same thing to be done by the United States.”

The assassination could only worsen ties between Turkey and Russia. The Turks are firmly against Syria President Bashar Assad’s regime. Meanwhile, Russia has fully backed the embattled leader and helped him destroy Syrian rebels for the last two years with airstrikes and troops and even has built a permanent base.

Russia's embassy tweeted it considered Karlov's death an act of terrorism.