Russian Federation suspends visa-free travel with Turkey

The Turkish Industrialists’ and Businessmen’s Association can not find explanations for the actions of the country’s President Recep Tayyip Erdogan and rings tocsin, Russia’s presidential press secretary, Dmitry Peskov, said on Saturday in an interview with the Vesti V Subbotu television programme at the Rossiya 24 channel.

‘Instead of (…) ensuring this never happens again, we are hearing unintelligible explanations and statements that there is nothing to apologise about’.

Russian Federation and Turkey have accused each other of aiding Islamic State, but both say they are battling the militants who have taken swathes of land in Iraq and Syria.

Erdogan also said that he asked to meet with Russian President Vladimir Putin in Paris on November 30, but got no response.

The package of measures bans the import of some goods from Turkey, prohibits employers from hiring Turkish nationals beginning next year, and suspends visa-free travel for Turkish citizens, the Interfax news agency reported.

Citing problems faced by Turks in Russian Federation in the wake of the incident the foreign ministry said non-urgent visits to Russian Federation should be avoided “until the situation becomes clear”.

Russia also claimed their plane was not over Turkish airspace when the jet was shot down, an allegation denied by Turkey as the country also insisted it did not know the jet was Russian.

Putin has called Turkey’s actions a “treacherous stab in the back” and maintained that the downed plane was flying over Syrian airspace, not Turkish.

Erdogan has said Turkey deserves the apology because its air space was violated by the Russian aircraft.

Russian President Vladimir Putin on Saturday called for sanctions against Turkey, following the downing this week by Turkey of a Russian warplane.

“We very sincerely recommend to Russian Federation not to play with fire”, the president told supporters during a speech in Bayburt, north-east Turkey.

“It is a too serious incident that serious consequences are unavoidable… and we are still waiting for realistic explanations from the Turkish side”, Peskov said.

Mr Putin’s foreign affairs adviser Yuri Ushakov said the Kremlin has received Mr Erdogan’s request for a meeting, but he would not say whether one will take place.

The president also attacked Russia’s policy in Syria after it launched air strikes in September, accusing the Kremlin of backing the regime of “murderer” President Bashar al-Assad.