Syria to export 700000 tons of citrus to Russia

On Tuesday, Turkish Foreign Ministry spokesperson Tanju Bilgic said Turkey sent additional forces to Bashiqa camp due to increasing clashes with the Islamic State (IS) in Mosul. The Turkish prime minister did not elaborate on what kind of measures Ankara is considering taking against Moscow.

“If we find it necessary, we will introduce retaliatory sanctions, this issue was discussed at a government meeting on Monday”.

Turkish Foreign Minister Mevlut Cavusoglu had a phone conversation with his Iraqi counterpart late Monday and reiterated Turkey’s respect for Iraq’s territorial integrity, Bilgic told reporters.

As a result, Russian Federation has imposed numerous financial sanctions on Turkey, such as bans on labor contract extensions for Turks, Turkish food imports, chartered flights from Russian Federation to Turkey and an end to free visit visas. “Such measures will have its toll on both economies and Russian people will suffer as much as Turkish people”, he added.

Putin said the results of strikes against Daesh targets with new high-precision weapons should be continually analyzed, and expressed hope that the fight against the terrorists would not require nuclear warheads. Turkey has rejected numerous Russian demands to apologize for the incident, saying it did nothing wrong.

Putin thanked everyone who participated in the operation to search for and retrieve the black box from Russia’s Su-24, which was shot down on November 24 by the Turkish Air Force.

While engaging with Russian Federation in a war of words, Turkey has also been wrangling with Iraq over sending troops into the war-torn country with informing the central government in Baghdad. This is a setback to Turkey as it relies heavily on tourism income, especially from Russian tourists.

Shoigu also said that Russia had now increased its intensity of airstrikes in Syria and carried out a massive aviation and missile attack using Tu-22 strategic bombers from the Russian territory.