Turkey defiant as Putin rebuffs Erdogan in Paris

Published December 1, 2015
ANKARA: Turkish and Russian military officials salute the ambulance carrying the coffin of the pilot killed when Turkey shot down a Russian jet last week.—Reuters
ANKARA: Turkish and Russian military officials salute the ambulance carrying the coffin of the pilot killed when Turkey shot down a Russian jet last week.—Reuters

BRUSSELS: After winning Nato military alliance’s support for the right to defend itself, Turkey dismissed on Monday any suggestion that it should apologise for downing a Russian warplane in its airspace last week.

“No country should ask us to apologise,” Turkey’s Prime Minister Ahmet Davutoglu told reporters following a meeting with Nato’s secretary general at the alliance’s headquarters here.

“The protection of our land borders, our airspace, is not only a right, it is a duty,” he said. “We apologise for committing mistakes, not for doing our duty.”

Russian President Vladimir Putin said on Nov 26 he was waiting for an apology after Turkey’s air force shot down the Su-24 fighter jet close to the Turkey-Syria border. Russian officials have said the plane was at no time over Turkey.

President Putin has also said Russia had told the United States about the Russian jet’s flight plan, but the US envoy to Nato denied this on Monday, saying US-Russia cooperation in Syria was limited to broader rules on safety measures.

“The US data that I have seen corroborates Turkey’s version of events. The airplane was in Turkey, it was engaged in Turkey, it had been warned repeatedly,” Ambassador Douglas Lute told reporters.

“There was no flight plan issued for a violation of Nato airspace.”

Mr Davutoglu also warned that “if there are two coalitions functioning in the same airspace against the Islamic State group’s militants, “these types of incidents will be difficult to prevent”.


Body of downed jet’s pilot sent to Russia


Mr Stoltenberg called for new emergency procedures to be agreed with Moscow to avoid triggering conflict by accident, whether that was during bombing raids in Syria or war games conducted by Russia and Nato.

Nato foreign ministers are expected to discuss such procedures at a meeting on Tuesday and Wednesday as Russia’s military activities from the Baltic to the Middle East come right up to -- and sometimes stray over -- Nato borders.

Mr Stoltenberg suggested revamping a Cold War-era treaty, the Vienna document, which sets the rules for large-scale exercises and other military activity, as well as telephone hotlines and other military communication channels. “It has to be modernised because there are several loopholes.”

Meanwhile, Mr Putin and US President Barack Obama discussed the Syria and Ukraine crises on the sidelines of a summit in Paris.

Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov told reporters that President Obama had expressed regret at the meeting over the downing of the Russian plane by Turkish military jets, and that both sides had spoken in favour of moving towards a political settlement of the Syria crisis.

According to a White House official, President Obama called for an easing of inflamed Russia-Turkey tensions in the closed-door meeting.

However, President Putin declined a meeting with his Turkish counterpart Recep Tayyip Erdogan at the climate conference.

“No meeting with Erdogan is planned. There is no discussion of such a meeting,” the spokesman said.

The snub came after the Turkish leader called for face-to-face talks with President Putin on the sidelines of the summit to discuss the shooting down of the plane.

Earlier, Turkey sent back to Russia the body of a pilot killed in the Nov 24 downing of the jet after it was delivered to it from Syria over the weekend.

One of the Russian pilots aboard the downed plane was shot dead in Syria after parachuting from the burning aircraft, while the second was found safe. A Russian soldier was killed in a rescue operation.

Russia also laid out more details of its economic sanctions aimed at denting Turkey’s key tourism and agricultural sectors.

It said it would halt fruit and vegetable imports from Turkey after President Putin signed a decree over the weekend banning charter flights and the sale of package holidays, also scrapping Russia’s visa-free regime with the country.

According to economists, the Russian sanctions can add at least $5 billion to Turkey’s current account deficit next year.

Trade between the two countries was worth $31bn last year. Russia has also long been one of Turkey’s biggest sources of tourists.—Reuters

Published in Dawn, December 1st, 2015

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