The authorities did not immediately confirm any operation against the hostage takers.

Members of Turkey’s Revolutionary People’s Liberation Party-Front (DHKP-C) have abducted a prosecutor probing the death of the youngest victim of 2013 mass anti-government protests inside a courthouse in Istanbul.

DHKP-C gunmen raided the sixth floor of the Caglayan courthouse, and took the prosecutor, Mehmet Selim Kiraz, hostage.

Kiraz was investigating the killing of Berkin Elvan, who died on March 11, 2014 after spending 269 days in a coma due to injuries inflicted by police in early summer 2013. Elvan was on his way to buy bread when he was caught up in a street protest in Istanbul’s Okmeydani neighborhood, in June 2013.

The abductors later posted a photo on social media, showing someone pointing a gun at Kiraz’s head with a DHKP-C flag hanging in the background.

Turkish police say negotiations have begun after demands were made from a far-left Turkish group that took an Istanbul prosecutor hostage and threatened to kill him.