Putin sends air defence missiles to Syria to deter Turkey

A Sukhoi Su-24 jet fighter drops flares during a joint Kazakh-Russian military exercise at Otar military range, west of Almaty

President Vladimir Putin on Wednesday ordered state-of-the art air defence missile systems to be deployed at a Russian air base in Syria following the downing of one of its warplanes by Turkey, a move that raised the threat of a military confrontation between the NATO member and Moscow.

The S-400 missile systems will be sent to the Hemeimeem air base in Syria’s coastal province of Latakia, located about 50 kilometers (30 miles) south of the border with Turkey. The systems are capable of targeting Turkish jets with deadly precision. If Russia shot down a Turkish plane, NATO would be required to intervene.

Turkey shot down a Russian Su-24 bomber on Tuesday, saying it crossed into its airspace from Syria despite repeated warnings. One of its two pilots was killed by militants after bailing out, while his crewmate was rescued by Syrian army commandos and delivered in good condition to the Russian base early Wednesday.

Putin said the Russian plane remained in Syria’s skies when it was shot down. He described Turkey’s action as a “crime” and a “stab in the back,” warning of serious consequences.

He said that the Russian Foreign Ministry’s warning to Russians not to visit Turkey was needed “because we can’t exclude some other incidents following what happened yesterday and our citizens in Turkey could be in significant danger.”

On Wednesday, the Russian leader ordered the military to deploy the S-400s to Hemeimeem and took other measures that “should be sufficient to ensure flight safety.”

Defence Minister Sergei Shoigu said Wednesday that the Russian missile cruiser Moskva already has moved closer to shore to protect the Russian aircraft flying missions near Syria’s border with Turkey with its long-range Fort air defence system.

“It will be ready to destroy any aerial target posing a potential danger to our aircraft,” he said at a meeting with military officials.

Shoigu also said that from now on all Russian bombers will be escorted by fighters on their combat missions in Syria. He said that his ministry has severed all contacts with the Turkish military.

Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov, who canceled his planned trip to Turkey after the incident, described the shooting down of the Russian plane as a “planned provocation.”

He said the Turkish action came after Russian planes successfully targeted oil infrastructure used by the ISIS group, alleging that Turkey benefited from the oil trade.

Lavrov also said that Turkish territory was used by “terrorists” to prepare attacks in other countries, but offered no details. He said that Russia “has no intention to go to war with Turkey,” but added that Moscow will re-consider its ties with Ankara.

Some leading Russian tourist agencies already have suspended the sales of tour packages to Turkey. Nearly 4.5 million Russians visited Turkey last year, second only to German tourists.

Some Russian lawmakers suggested that Moscow should respond to the downing of the plane by cracking down on Turkish companies in Russia, but Lavrov said that “we don’t want to artificially create problems for Turkish producers and exporters, who aren’t responsible for what has happened.” Still, he added that “we can’t but react to what has happened.”

Russia was the biggest source of Turkish imports last year, worth $25 billion, which mostly accounted for Russian gas supplies.

Most Turkish exports to Russia are textiles and food, and although Turkish food exports have not been covered by the Russian food embargo, they fell by 40 percent in January-September this year compared to a year ago.

Turkish Foreign Ministry said in a written statement that Foreign Minister Mevlut Cavusoglu and Lavrov agreed to a meeting "in the coming days," during their telephone conversation Wednesday, but Lavrov said he has no such plans.

Turkey informed the U.N. that two Russian planes disregarded warnings and violated Turkish airspace "to a depth of 1.36 miles and 1.15 miles in length for 17 seconds."

Lavrov shrugged off the Turkish argument that it had no other choice but to shoot the plane down, pointing at the 2012 downing of a Turkish warplane by Syria in its airspace, saying that Ankara argued then that a brief incursion wasn’t a reason to shoot down its jet. He also pointed at routine violations of Greece’s airspace by Turkish combat planes.

Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan said Wednesday that his country doesn’t wish to escalate tensions with Russia over the downing of the plane.

Speaking at an Organization of Islamic Cooperation economy meeting in Istanbul, Erdogan said that Turkey favors “peace, dialogue and diplomacy.” He defended his country’s move to shoot down the plane saying: “no one should expect Turkey to stay silent to border violations or the violation of its rights."

Turkish Prime Minister Ahmet Davutoglu also sought to ease tensions, saying that Russia is Turkey's "friend and neighbor" and insisting relations cannot be "sacrificed to accidents of communication."

In a sign of the tensions, protesters in Moscow hurled eggs and stones at the Turkish Embassy, breaking windows in the compound. Police cleared the area and made some arrests shortly after the protest began.

Davutoglu told his party's lawmakers on Wednesday that Turkey didn't know the nationality of the plane that was brought down on Tuesday until Moscow announced it was Russian.

He again defended Turkey's action, saying Russia was warned on several occasions that Turkey would take action in case its border is violated in line with its military rules of engagement.

Davutoglu also said Russia is an "important partner and tops the list of countries with which we have shown great sensitivity in building ties."

The Turkish prime minister, however, also criticized Russian and Syrian operations in Syria's Turkmen region, saying there is "not one single" presence of the ISIS group there. Davutoglu demanded that operations there stop immediately.

France's Hollande heads to Russia to press anti-ISIS coalition

French President Francois Hollande walks to his office at the end of the weekly cabinet meeting at the Elysee Palace in Paris, France, November 25, 2015

French President Francois Hollande on Thursday will hold talks with Russian leader Vladimir Putin, as part of his diplomatic marathon to forge a broader coalition against ISIS in the wake of the Paris attacks.

The French president will meet with Italian Prime Minister Matteo Renzi in Paris in the morning, before heading to Moscow where he will hold talks with the Russian strongman.

Hollande has been on a whirlwind tour seeking to build a coalition to crush ISIS in Iraq and Syria but has seen few concrete pledges so far, and his campaign has been further complicated by a diplomatic spat between Russia and Turkey.

France invoked a clause requiring EU member states to provide military assistance after the November 13 attacks in Paris, when 130 people lost their lives in a wave of killings by suicide bombers and gunmen claimed by ISIS.

German Chancellor Angela Merkel on Wednesday pledged to stand beside France in its fight against the militant group after talks with Hollande, vowing to act "swiftly" to see how Germany can help in the fight against terrorism.

The French and German leaders each laid a pink rose among the tributes of flowers and candles in Place de la Republique, the Paris square that has become a rallying point since the bloodshed.

Hours earlier, Defence Minister Ursula von der Leyen said Germany would send 650 soldiers to Mali to provide some relief to French forces fighting militants there.

Meanwhile in Britain, Prime Minister David Cameron will on Thursday set out the case for his country to extend its air strikes against ISIS from Iraq into Syria ahead of a vote by MPs next week.

The British premier has called ISIS a "direct threat to our security at home and abroad" and on Monday offered to let France use the RAF Akrotiri air base in Cyprus when flying missions against the militants.

Cameron met with Hollande earlier this week and has said he "firmly supported" France's actions, but US President Barack Obama has given the idea of greater cooperation with Russia against ISIS a much cooler reception.

Hollande's diplomatic efforts also suffered a blow after Turkey shot down a Russian jet, sparking a diplomatic incident between the rival powers fighting in Syria that has threatened to escalate into a wider conflict.

Turkey's military said Wednesday it did not know the warplane it shot down was Russian and it was ready for "all kinds of cooperation" with Russia, after Moscow called the incident a "planned provocation".

The sole surviving pilot said he had received no warning and the aircraft did not violate Turkish air space, prompting the Turkish army to release audio recordings it said showed the Russian jet was repeatedly warned to change course.

Moscow has intensified its strikes in Syria after ISIS claimed it brought down a Russian passenger plane over Egypt last month, killing all 224 people on board.

Russia carried out heavy raids in Syria's northern Latakia province on Wednesday, the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights monitoring group said, in the same area where Turkey downed the Russian fighter.

Ankara and Moscow are on opposing sides in the four-year Syrian conflict, with Turkey wanting to see the ouster of President Bashar al-Assad while Russia is one of his last remaining allies.

Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov has backed the French president's proposal to close off the Syria-Turkey border, considered the main crossing point for foreign fighters seeking to join ISIS.

"I think this is a good proposal and tomorrow President Hollande will talk to us in greater detail about it. We would be ready to seriously consider the necessary measures for this," Lavrov said in Moscow.

French jets on Monday launched their first air strikes from the Charles de Gaulle aircraft carrier in the eastern Mediterranean.

Prime Minister Manuel Valls told the French parliament, which overwhelmingly supported pressing the air campaign against ISIS, that "there is no alternative, we must annihilate Daesh", speaking to the chamber on Wednesday.

#Obama urges #Gulf nations to help with chaos in #Libya

President Barack Obama urged Gulf nations to help calm the chaotic political situation in Libya, saying that outside military action would not be enough to help reduce tensions in the war-ravaged North African country.

After a meeting with Italian Prime Minister Matteo Renzi at the White House on Friday , Obama said a political solution was needed in the oil-rich Mediterranean state, where two rival governments are fighting for control.

"We're going to have to encourage some of the countries inside of the Gulf who have, I think, influence over the various factions inside of Libya to be more cooperative themselves," Obama told reporters.

"In some cases, you've seen them fan the flames of military conflict, rather than try to reduce them."

Obama is set to meet with leaders from Saudi Arabia and other members of the Gulf Cooperation Council in Washington on May 13 and 14 to discuss a host of crises in the Middle East.

Obama noted Islamic State militants, who have taken over large parts of Syria and Iraq, have also been active in Libya. The United States is leading a coalition fighting the group in Iraq and Syria.

"We are consistently looking where terrorist threats might emanate, and Libya, obviously, is an area of great concern," Obama said. He compared the situation to Somalia, where Washington has carried out drone strikes against suspected al Qaeda militants.

"We will not be able to solve the problem with just a few drone strikes or a few military operations," he said, adding that he and Renzi did not discuss the possible sale of U.S. drones to Italy, which some Italian media reports had expected.

The United States, Italy and their allies must combine counterterrorism efforts with a push for a political resolution, Obama said.

"The answer ultimately is to have a government that can control its own borders and work with us. That's going to take some time," he said.

Renzi agreed it was up to the Libyans themselves. "Peace in Libya: either the tribes do this, or no one is going to do this," he said. 

#UN warns : Millions of Middle East children out of school

Children walk among debris from a damaged school building in the Damascus suburb of Zamalka

More than 12 million children in the Middle East are not being educated despite advances in efforts to expand schooling, the UN children's agency UNICEF said on Wednesday.

The figure does not include children forced from school by the conflicts in Syria and Iraq, who would bring the total not receiving an education to 15 million, the agency said in a new report.

The joint report by UNICEF and UN cultural agency UNESCO's Institute for Statistics praises the "considerable resources and political capital" devoted to expanding education in the Middle East over the last decade.

It notes that "out-of-school rates for primary school children have plummeted, often by as much as half."

"But in recent years, progress has stalled," it says, with 4.3 million primary-aged children and 2.9 million lower secondary-aged children out of school.

An additional 5.1 million children are not getting a year of pre-primary school education, bringing the total number of the region's children out of school to 12.3 million, the report says.

That figure represents around 15 percent of the children in the Middle East who should be receiving pre-primary, primary or secondary education.

The report says a study of nine countries in the region revealed a range of reasons that kept children out of school, including poverty.

In many cases, families could not afford costs associated with schooling, including books and uniforms, or the loss of income from a child who could be put to work.

"In countries where a substantial group of children remain out of school, they are predominantly from the poorest households in rural areas," the report says.

Gender discrimination also remains a factor.

"Girls are undervalued, and since they are not expected to work, their families see no need for them to learn," the report says, adding that early marriage is also an issue in most countries in the region.

Elsewhere, violence is a problem -- either inside schools, or in conflict zones like Syria and Iraq, where millions of children no longer have access to education and schools have been caught up in violence.

The report says keeping children in school once they enrolled was a key problem, with high drop-out rates at most levels in many countries in the region.

It proposes three main recommendations, including a focus on early childhood development (ECD), noting that pre-primary education is an area where the disparity between wealthy and poor children is most stark in the region.

"Levelling the playing field in terms of equal access to ECD is a matter of urgency," it said.

It also urges a cross-sector approach to helping children enter school, pointing out that factors from transportation to health can affect whether a child is enrolled or not.

Finally, it suggests a focus on "retention," ensuring that children are not pushed out of education once they enrol because of factors like corporal punishment or falling behind peers.

It also notes that special attention must be paid to the situation of children caught up in war, "given the recurring character of conflicts" in the region.

"The international community should ensure sufficient funding for education in emergencies and national governments in the region should adopt flexible approaches for accommodating the education needs of conflict-affected children."