"I heard that the Turkish President was interested in football. I am a former football player, as well. I will invite him to play a football match when I see him in person," said Chilean FM Munoz during his official visit to Turkey, attending the Ambassador Conference.

Munoz stated that trade and football were two important fields that could strengthen relations between Chile and Turkey.

"I am familiar with many Turkish football teams due to Chilean players in the Turkish league. Football may encourage the public of the two countries to know each other better."

Turkish President Erdoğan who was a semi-professional footballer playing for Kasımpaşa Sport Club, is known for his talent in football around the world.

The anti-Daesh raids came hours after a deadly suicide attack in Istanbul's most popular tourist area, Sultanahmet, which killed at least 10 people, including some tourists, and injured 15 others.

Explosion rocks central Istanbul square; 10 killed, 15 injured

Ankara police said the Daesh members were preparing for a surveillance operation on some public buildings in Ankara when they were raided by intelligence units of Ankara police department.

Police said the operation was launched after a close-follow of the group's activities for several days.

Turkish national İ.K. was reportedly sent to prison after questioning, while 15 Syrian citizens have been taken to the Foreign Bureau of Ankara Police Headquarters for official deportation.

Video: Moments of panic during Sultanahmet explosion

A special group of three envoys flew to Nakhichevan and brought Talibov back to Ankara with the cooperation of the Ministry of Health, Ankara University, Department of State and the private sector.

She was taken to Ankara with extracorporeal life support, a first in Turkey, according to the Turkish daily Milliyet newspaper.

Her relatives were also brought to Turkey on a separate plane.

She was suffering from Acute Respiratory Distress Syndrome, but was able to breathe with a pipe reaching to her glottis, said the Azerbaijani doctor who briefed Turkish doctors.

Talibov is under observation at the Ibni-i Sina Hospital and recovering from her illness. She is expected to come out of the hospital in a few weeks.

Ankara Chief Public Prosecutor's office said Sunday that the second perpetrator was a Syrian national, identified with his initials as E.U.

The first attacker was identified as Daesh-linked Yunus Emre Alagoz on Oct. 19, 2015.

In a statement, the prosecutor's office said Alagoz had come to Turkey from Syria but gave no time frame for his return.

The 10.05 a.m. blasts outside Ankara's main train station, which claimed 102 lives and injured hundreds on Oct. 14 of last year targeted a group of peace activists and trades unionists assembling for a rally.

On Oct. 20, police shared an image taken by a security camera that shows two figures walking along a sunlit pavement flanked on one side by heavy traffic on the morning of the bombing.

The pair appear to be wearing dark clothing and seem to have just walked from under a traffic overpass. Three vehicles can be seen on their left, including a distinctive yellow taxi, and on their right is a grass verge.

The grainy image was taken just after the suspects had got out of a taxi, the police source said. The source did not indicate where the image came from, the exact time of day it was taken or the location.

The twin blasts shook Turkey as the country faced a general election re-run on Nov. 1, amid ongoing counter-terrorism operations in the southeast and a raging civil war along its southern border in Syria.

Dozens of suspected Daesh supporters were rounded up in the days following the bombing.

Sarı, who has produced more than 100 pieces of work so far, is now preparing a very special gift to Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan.

"We have prepared a table for our President. Hopefully, I will give my present to him during the opening of the İzmit Bay Bridge," said Sarı.

Sarı said that he had been producing lead items for long time, after making models for years.

Galeri: Erdogan to receive a 'millimetric' pencil art gift

"Previously I was making models but one day I asked myself what I could do more extraordinary. I just remembered how much I was interested in pencils. Then I decided to produce lead items. This art requires a lot of time and patience. Sometimes even I cannot believe that I made some of the items I did," said Sarı, adding that when he starts he produces easy items at the beginning.

The artist uses diamond bits and surgical instruments while carving the sculptures instead of machines, due to the lead's fragility.

"I do not use any device, because the physical structure of the lead is not a suitable material for machine vibration. Diamond bits and surgical instruments are my main tools," he said.

Sarı also told that there are only several pencil artists all around the world, which makes this art uncommon.

“Today I have dozens of unique art pieces which haven't been explored and imitated yet. Also, there are only several pencil artists like me around the world," said Sarı.

“I am determined to be one of the most famous and prominent artists," he added.

Video: 'Erdoğan love' in Gaza

Gökçek has declared new projects during the meeting aiming at promoting fields such as tourism, security and transportation.

The meeting, held with the participation of Turkish Prime Minister Ahmet Davutoğlu, revealed the details of the projects planned.

Galeri: 'Bosporus' to be built in Turkey's capital Ankara

One of the most significant projects is the Ankara Strait project, an 11-kilometer-long canal at the Imrahor Valley in Ankara's south, surrounded with villas and recreation sites.

The world's largest theme park ANKAPARK, Ankara Strait and viaducts of the North Star Mosque and Complex, the rearrangement of the Ulus statue surroundings, urban transformation work in the four corners of the city and new transportation projects are among the plans introduced during the meeting.

Also works are to be carried out about the Ottoman Family Life Center, Eryaman Stadium and Ankara Exhibition and Convention Centre.

The projects are expected to be completed in the next 3 years.

According to officials from the prosecutor's office, the suspects are charged with of belonging to a terror organization and possessing an explosive substance.

Earlier in the day, the Ankara prosecutor had questioned the suspects and requested their imprisonment to the court.

Premier salutes Turkish police over bomb plot arrests

Musa Canoz, 28, and Adnan Yildirim, 40, were arrested Wednesday over an alleged plot to commit a suicide bomb attack in the city's main square, which is the scene of annual Dec. 31 celebrations.

The Ankara Chief Prosecutor's office said the suspects had targeted two locations near Kizilay, a shopping and restaurant district in the heart of the city, and were equipped with explosive vests packed with steel ball bearings.

Prosecutors said the arrests were carried out in Yakup Abdal, a neighborhood on the southern outskirts of Ankara.

Ankara was targeted by twin suicide bombings on Oct. 10, when 103 people were killed in an attack on protesters gathering outside the city's main train station for a peace rally.

The attack, which also left hundreds wounded, was the deadliest in modern Turkish history and has been attributed to Daesh supporters.

The source, who spoke on condition of anonymity, did not specify the nature of the alleged planned attack.

Two under-18s were among those arrested on suspicion of preparing acts of terrorism, the source said. Three suspects have appeared in court and were remanded in custody while another was released. Four others are still being held by police.

The arrests took place on Wednesday and Thursday in the Ankara area.

The PKK is considered a terrorist organization by Turkey, the U.S. and the EU. More than 200 members of the security forces have been martyred since the group resumed its armed campaign in late July.

The suicide bombers are linked with the Daesh terrorist organization, according to the Ankara Public Prosecutor's Office and security sources.

Several suicide bomb vests and bomb devices reinforced with steel balls and rods were seized during the operation.

The suspects, who were identified, were taken to the Ankara Police Directorate Anti-Terror Branch to be questioned.

An official said that, the two men, who entered Turkey from Syria, were thought to have been preparing an attack on Kizilay square in the center of Ankara, where crowds usually gather to celebrate the New Year.

It is reported that while no one was injured in the fire and a total of 253 shops in trade center were destroyed.

The reason of fire has not been known, however; flames reportedly spread all the shops in a very short time because shops were very close to each other and there were many of plastic materials in shops.

While fire fighter and police units arrived at scene over the call of the people, more fire fighters from the other districts were sent at scene in order to keep the fire under control.

Police has launched an investigation on fire.

The meeting, which was held on Tuesday, was closed to the media.

Gwen Sancar, the wife of Aziz Sancar, also attended the meeting, which lasted for 1.5 hours.

"I handed the award to the Chief of the General Staff," Sancar said after the meeting with President Erdoğan.

"I am planning to return to Turkey to contribute to studies in the country. I am very thankful to my country. And I miss Turkish people and simit the most," he said in his statement to Turkish A Haber television.

He also said that he is proud of the Ottoman Empire and the Turkish Republic in response to a question about a symbol on the tie he was wearing.

Dr. Sancar won the Nobel Prize for his contribution to mapping the ways cells safeguard genetic information.

He has been researching DNA repair and the regulation of the Circadian clock for years.

Tafsirs are basically interpretations and commentaries on the Quran by leading Islamic scholars.

Like most Kurds in Turkey, Mahfuz Acikgoz, an imam at a mosque in eastern Bitlis province, was full of praise for the release of the official Kurdish translation of Quran in May.

"It was a significant, but a delayed action," Acikgoz said.

But he said that Diyanet needed to do more. "Just Quran translation is not enough, we also ask for translation of the Tafsir [books]," he said.

There are thousands of Tafsirs around the world, including many published by Turkish religious scholars. People like Acikgoz say the Turkish body could start with a translation of any Tafsir it believed was most authentic.

Mahmut Caduk, an academic at the Ankara-based Yildirim Beyazit University's Persian Language and Literature Department, also agreed on the need for a Tafsir translation.

"Kurdish translation of a Tafsir will also contribute to understanding of the translation of the Quran," Caduk said.

Zahir Ertekin, an academic at the Bingol University's Kurdish Language and Literature Department, said that while the official Kurdish translation of the Quran had added a "huge richness" to the Kurdish literature, its current readability was lower than expected since the Quran itself was not a simple text to understand without the Tafsirs.

Ertekin said that the Kurdish people would not be able to read it unless they fully understand the Latin alphabet of Kurdish languages.

In May, Diyanet printed 10,000 copies of the Kurdish translation of Quran in Turkey. At least, 5,000 of these copies had both the Arabic Quranic text and Kurdish translation side-by-side. Diyanet now plans to release 20,000 more such Kurdish translations in the near future.

Although this was the first time that Turkey's state institution had launched a Kurdish translation of Islam's holiest book, there have been other Kurdish translations in the market.

Acikgoz said that the first such known translation was published by Abdullah Varli in 1994. He believed that the newly-released official Kurdish translation would soon surpass other less authentic works in the market and people like him would have the peace of mind that it was translated by authentic experts.

Zubeyir Aslan, who lives in southeastern Mardin province, also said that other Kurdish translations of the Quran had been available for more than 20 years.

"[However,] this [state-body released] translation is kind of a revolution for the Kurds in Turkey," Aslan said.

Although the official Kurdish translation was a massive improvement on the previous works, translators admit there is still some room for improvement.

Huseyin Gunduz, one of the two translators of the official Kurdish Quran, said that while the translation mostly prompted positive reactions, there were also some reservations expressed about certain choice of words in the Kurdish translated text.

"Some said the language was too heavy to understand and some raised their reactions over a word they did not know," Gunduz said.

Gunduz, who lives in southeastern Batman province, said that future editions would consider the feedback received. About the process of working on the translation, he said that experts with vast knowledge of Kurdish and Arabic had worked on the project.

"We worked like a commission; we also got editing support from experts in Kurdish language," Gunduz said.

Caduk said that constructive criticism always helped such projects. "Constructive criticism of the Kurdish translation will contribute into efforts of translation works of the Quran," he said.

He also pointed out there was a critical shortage in Kurdish translation of the religious books apart from the Quran and called on Turkey's top religious body to fill the gap of Kurdish translation in Islamic literature such as basics of religion for children.

Kurdish belongs to a northwestern Iranian branch of the Indo-European family. It is accepted as the fourth most spoken language in the Middle East, after Arabic, Persian and Turkish.

Turkey's religious affairs directorate has accelerated the translation of Quran into different languages in the last decade, with plans to publish in dozens of languages, including German, English, French and Russian.

Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan, Parliament Speaker Ismet Yilmaz and other senior political figures also attended the commemoration ceremony at the mausoleum, known as Anitkabir.

The commemoration ceremonies are taking place across the country, but the center of attraction is the grand mausoleum complex that also houses a museum.

Daily life stopped for two minutes, beginning at 9.05 a.m., local time [0705GMT] the time of Ataturk's death. Sirens wailed throughout Turkey, and people observed two minutes of silence.

Ataturk was born in 1881 in Thessaloniki in what was then the Ottoman Empire. He made his mark in the military in 1915 when he led forces to repel the allied invasion in Canakkale, known in the West as the Dardanelles.

Following the collapse of the Ottoman Empire after the First World War, Ataturk led the Turkish War of Independence, which defeated European powers. When he became president, Ataturk transformed the former empire into a modern and secular country.

Ataturk passed away on November 10, 1938, at the age of 57.