Coalition aircraft re-routed at least once to avoid Russians in Syria

The Syrian push on the ground is the first time Mr Assad’s forces have co-ordinated with the Russian airforce in an attempt to seize lost territory from opposition forces, ushering in a few of the fiercest fighting in months in the civil war, which has now lasted four and a half years and killed over a quarter of a million people.

Meanwhile, Syrian ground troops have launched an offensive under Russian air cover, Syrian officials say. However, there were no reports of large explosions in ISIS-held parts of Syria farther east – making it less likely that the cruise missiles went there instead.

In the course of another phase of the anti-terrorist operation that Russia is now conducting in Syria, the Russian Armed Forces used long-range cruise missiles. Shoigu insisted that it destroyed all the targets and did perform any strikes on civilian areas.

But in Iraq, the head of parliament’s defence and security committee said Baghdad may request Russian air strikes against Islamic State on its soil soon and wants Moscow to have a bigger role than Washington in fighting the group.

During the meeting with President Putin, Mr Shoigu said 112 targets had been hit since the Russian bombing began.

Of more significance may be early signs of Syrian government counter-offensives – aided by their allies – which could be linked to the Russian air campaign.

Countries carrying out airstrikes in Syria should coordinate with each other to de-conflict Syrian airspace, a United Nations spokesman said Wednesday. “And we call on everybody else to do the same”.

Russia’s Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu said fourRussian navy ships in the Caspian launched 26 cruise missiles at Islamic State targets in Syria.

“We don’t have to deploy the North Atlantic Treaty Organisation Response Force or the spearhead force to deliver deterrence”, Stoltenberg said.

“It is important that there should be such talks between Russian Federation and all the countries who are interested in exchanging intelligence and operational information… including the United States”, he added.

He took issue with what he said were suggestions in the news media that the United States was cooperating with Russia on Syria, He said that the only exchanges that the Pentagon and the Russian military could have on Syria at the moment were technical discussions on how to steer clear of each other’s way in the skies above the country – called “deconfliction” talks.

He did not specify where the operation would take place, but said Russian air strikes had helped “weaken the fighting capabilities of Daesh and other terrorist groups”, using the Arabic acronym for IS.

Germany’s defense minister said Berlin would go ahead with plans to switch off its Patriot batteries in Turkey next week and withdraw most of the soldiers operating them before Christmas.

Officials at the U.S.-led alliance are still smarting from Russia’s weekend incursions into Turkey’s airspace near northern Syria.

The Kremlin leader said in televised remarks that his French counterpart made the proposal in Paris on Friday during a summit to boost the peace process in Ukraine also attended by German Chancellor Angela Merkel and Ukrainian President Petro Porochenko.

Turkey said Syria-based missile systems harassed its warplanes on Tuesday while eight F-16 jets were on a patrol flight along the Syria border.