The Russian pilot who went missing after his plane was shot down by Turkey near the Turkey-Syria border is “alive and well” at a Russian airbase in Syria after a rescue operation by Russian special forces.
Russia launched a 12-hour rescue operation to recover the pilot form the downed plane, who reportedly had been taken captive by a Syrian rebel group after parachuting into their territory.
His co-pilot and a marine involved in a failed rescue attempt were killed.
The downing of a Russian Su-24 plane by an air-to-air missile launched from a Turkish F-16 near the Syrian border on Tuesday has raised tensions between the two countries.
Turkey’s President Recep Erdogan described the incident as the defence of Turkish air space, and claims the Russian plane strayed over the Syrian border and ignored 10 warnings by the Turkish air force.
#BREAKING Flight radar track on downed warplane issued by Turkish military pic.twitter.com/xREQbclVwK
— CNN Türk ENG (@CNNTURK_ENG) November 24, 2015
However, Russian President Vladimir Putin denies the plane entered Turkish air space and received no warnings. He has called the incident a “stab in the back” delivered to them by the “accomplices of terrorists”.
Russia counters Turkish radar pic with flight map showing no airspace violation. MH17 deniability quagmire detected pic.twitter.com/l8OYlPUXBp
— Alec Luhn (@ASLuhn) November 24, 2015
In the ongoing Syrian conflict, Russia backs the Assad regime and has launched air strikes against a variety of anti-Assad rebel groups, including moderate groups backed by the US, and claims they are all “terrorists” aligned to the Islamic State and al-Qaeda.
Meanwhile, Turkey continues to back a number of rebel organisations, including moderate and jihadist groups, in their fight against Assad. Turkey has also launched a number of air strikes against Kurdish groups within Syria, who fight directly against the Islamic State.
Turkey is a member of Nato, where Article 5 of the treaty says that an attack on the territorial integrity of one member state is treated as an attack on all members states. The escalation in tension between Russia and Turkey due to the downing of the Russian plane could therefore trigger a wider conflict if not handled delicately.
The UN and Nato called for calm and the de-escalation of rhetoric between Russia and Turkey in an effort to avoid the situation escalating into conflict.
