Turkey involved in Islamic State oil trade, Russian defence ministry claims

Officials produced aerial and satellite photographs showing thousands of oil tanker lorries streaming from Isis-controlled oil wells in Syria and Iraq into Turkish sea ports and refineries.

“We know for example who in Turkey fills their pockets and allows terrorists to make money from the stolen oil in Syria”, Mr Putin said. The appalling part about it is that the country’s top political leadership is involved in the illegal business, President Erdogan and his family.

“Maybe I’m being too blunt, but one can only entrust control over this thieving business to one’s closest associates”.

Antonov said Erdogan’s son heads a leading Turkish energy company and that his son-in-law has been named Turkey’s energy minister.

Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan has rejected Russian claims that he and his family are profiting from trade in oil with the Islamic State group.

President Erdogan also denied the claims.

Antonov added that since Russian Federation began targeting the oil operations in Syria on September 30, ISIS’ income from illegal oil smuggling has been halved, from about $3 million per day to $1.5 million a day.

According to him, Ankara also failed to respond to Moscow’s concerns about the free movement of terrorists as a result of the visa-free regime of the Russian Federation and Turkey (Russia has now abolished visa-free travel for Turkish citizens – Editor).

Referring to ISIS by the Arabic term Daesh, he said: “Nobody has the right to slander Turkey by saying Turkey is buying Daesh oil”.

Antonov offered no evidence of involvement by Erdogan or any of his family members in oil trade with IS. “And they will regret what they did a few times”.

“Turkish firms are not simply anxious about a reduction in LPG deliveries from Russian Federation because of the current situation – they are already preparing for this”, one trader who works in the LPG market told Reuters.

Turkey said it shot down the plane after it violated its airspace for 17 seconds despite repeated warnings, while Russian Federation has insisted that the aircraft has stayed in Syria’s airspace.

And while Turkey’s efforts might only put a dent in one portion of Islamic State funding, USA officials say any defensive action by Erdoğan would be better than nothing.

With tensions continuing, the two countries have suspended talks on their joint TurkStream project to pipe gas from Russian Federation to Turkey and southern Europe. “We are not planning to engage in military saber-rattling (with Turkey)”, said the Russian President and added: “But if anyone thinks that having committed this terrible war crime, the murder of our people, that they are going to get away with some measures concerning their tomatoes or some limits on construction and other sectors, they are sorely mistaken”.