Turkey said on Monday that it is "deeply concerned" over the suspicious killings of four Muslim individuals since November in the U.S. city of Albuquerque, New Mexico.
"We are deeply concerned about the suspicious consecutive killings of four Muslim individuals since November in the U.S. city of Albuquerque, three of which have been in the past week," the Foreign Ministry said in a statement.
"We want the perpetrators of these serial murders, which are stated to be related to each other and may be hate crimes, to be found immediately and brought to justice," the statement said.
Extending condolences to the families and relatives of the victims, it said "we expect the relevant U.S. authorities to meticulously carry out all kinds of investigations" to clarify all aspects of the incidents.
"We are deeply worried about these serial murders," Presidential Spokesperson Ibrahim Kalin also said on Twitter, underlining the need to shine a light on the killings and for the perpetrators to be brought to justice as soon as possible.
After a Muslim man was killed in the southern state of New Mexico on Friday, authorities said they were working to determine if his murder was linked to three others in the past nine months.
Albuquerque Police Chief Harold Medina said the killing could be linked to three other Muslim men who were killed in "ambush-style shootings."
While authorities reiterated a request for anyone with information on the killings to contact the police, it was reported that security measures were increased in certain areas of the city where the Muslim community resides.
The Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR), the country's largest Muslim civil rights organization, increased a reward to $10,000 from $5,000 for information leading to the suspect or suspects related to the killings.
Albuquerque police official Kyle Hartsock said Thursday that the person or persons who killed the Muslims might be the same individual or individuals.
President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan said earlier this year that Islamophobia continues to spread like a plague in Western countries.
In a video message at the 2nd International Media and Islamophobia Forum in the capital Ankara, the president said Islamophobia is “poisoning all segments of society, from people on the street to politicians, workers, and civil servants.”
He further said: “The atmosphere of hatred promoted by irresponsible media negatively affects Muslims as well as millions of people with different languages, religions, origins, and cultures.
“The embarrassing debates in the context of the Ukraine crisis reveal the dangerous dimensions of Islamophobia and cultural racism.”
Erdoğan denounced discrimination against all vulnerable people around the world, stressing that Islamophobia is not only an issue for Muslims but should also be for all people worldwide.
“Otherwise, we cannot prevent Islamophobic attacks like (the ones in) New Zealand in 2019 and Canada in 2021,” he warned.
The president emphasized that along with Western politicians, media outlets and state institutions, the biggest responsibility falls on the Islamic world and its institutions.
“Muslims must react strongly, seek their rights on legitimate grounds, and fight against this injustice, unlawfulness and discrimination, which targets hundreds of millions of people along with them,” he said.
Also, police in New Mexico on Sunday asked for the public's help in locating a "vehicle of interest" in their probe of four fatal shootings of Muslim men whose slayings in Albuquerque over the past nine months are believed by investigators to be related.
Mayor Tim Keller said state authorities were working to provide an "extra police presence at mosques during times of prayer" as the investigation proceeds in New Mexico's largest city, home to as many as 5,000 Muslims out of some 565,000 total residents.
The latest victim, police said, was gunned down on Friday night, in a killing that local Islamic leaders said occurred shortly after he had attended funeral services for two others slain during the past couple of weeks.
All three of those men, as well as the very first victim who was shot dead in November, were Muslim men of Pakistani or Afghan descent who resided in Albuquerque.
Police have given few details of the latest murder but described the first three killings as ambush shootings. Governor Michelle Lujan Grisham has characterized them as "targeted killings of Muslim residents."
U.S. President Joe Biden posted a message on Twitter on Sunday expressing solidarity with the Muslim community, adding, "These hateful attacks have no place in America."
Albuquerque police officials told a news conference hours later that they were following a number of leads and issued a bulletin with photos of a four-door, dark gray Volkswagen sedan with tinted windows that they described as a "vehicle of interest" in the investigation.
It was left unclear how the car was tied to the case, and police said they had yet to determine whether they were seeking one or more suspects in the investigation.
The three latest victims belonged to the same mosque, according to Tahir Gauba, a spokesperson for the Islamic Center of New Mexico. Officials were withholding the identity of the man killed on Friday pending notification of next of kin.
But Gauba said he was killed shortly after attending the funeral for the two previous victims.
Muhammed Afzaal Hussain, 27, a planning director for the city of Espanola who immigrated from Pakistan, was shot dead on Aug. 1 outside his apartment complex, less than a week after Aftab Hussein, 41, from Albuquerque's large Afghan community, was found slain on July 26 near the city's international district, police said. Hussain also worked on the campaign team for U.S. Representative Melanie Stansbury of New Mexico.
Police said they were treating those two slayings, along with Friday's killing, as linked to the Nov. 7 murder of 62-year-old Mohammad Ahmadi, also a Muslim from Afghanistan, who was shot to death in a parking lot outside a halal supermarket and cafe.
"There are several things in common with all four of the homicides," city police spokesman Gilbert Gallegos told reporters on Sunday.
Asked whether investigators consider the killings to be hate crimes, Gallegos said, "Hate is determined by motive, and we don't know that motive at this point."
Gauba estimated there are 3,000 to 5,000 Muslims living in and around Albuquerque, accounting for about 85% of the entire state's Islamic population.
New Mexico State Police, the FBI and the U.S. Marshals Service are among the agencies assisting in the investigation.
