“A stab in the back”. So the Russian president Vladimir Putin he described the Turkish army's move to shoot down a Russian Air Force Sukhoi 16 fighter jet on the border with Syria using F-24s. Ankara for its part accused the aircraft of having entered its airspace and of ignoring the repeated warnings with which it was asked to leave, but Moscow denies it and Putin speaks of a "crime", of a "stab in the back launched by accomplices of terrorists” and warns his colleague Erdogan that the incident will have “serious repercussions” on relations between Moscow and Ankara.
According to the reconstructions the two Russian pilots would also have been killed: they had managed to jump with a parachute, but according to some sources they would have been captured and killed later. One of the two is officially given up for dead, according to reports from a group of anti-Assad rebels, who also showed his lifeless body in a video. Meanwhile, Turkey has summoned the Russian charge d'affaires and has obtained an emergency summons by this evening (it is in progress) of NATO Council of the North Atlantic, the highest decision-making body composed of the ambassadors of the 28 allied countries.
"It is our internationally recognized right to take all necessary measures against anyone who violates our airspace or our borders," said the Turkish premier. Ahmet Davutoğlu. Moscow responded by summoning the military attaché of the Turkish embassy, with the Duma who accused Ankara of "helping IS terrorists". The Russian Foreign Minister's visit to Istanbul was also cancelled, Sergei Lavrov.
In the meantime a new episode, probably of a terrorist nature, has occurred in Tunis: At least 11 people were killed in the Tunisian capital and several others were injured in the explosion that hit a presidential guard bus, in the city centre. The bombing currently has no claim.
