But Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan will not admit to profiting from oil deals with terrorists even if his face is “smeared with smuggled oil”, Antonov said.
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Negotiations over the project to pipe Russian gas to Turkey under the Black Sea have been floundering since Moscow launched air strikes in Syria in late September in support of the regime of President Bashar al-Assad, which Ankara fiercely opposes.
“The main customer for this oil stolen from Syria and Iraq is Turkey”, Deputy Defence Minister Anatoly Antonov said.
“Nobody attaches any value to the lies of this Soviet-style propaganda machine”, he told a news conference before leaving on an official visit to Azerbaijan.
Turkey has become Moscow’s prime global sparring partner after it shot down a Russian jet on its border with Syria on November 24 – sparking fury and economic sanctions from the Kremlin.
Without naming the United States, he accused Washington and its allies of turning Iraq, Syria and Libya into a “zone of chaos and anarchy threatening the entire world” by supporting change of regimes in those countries.
The Russian defense ministry also alleged that the same criminal networks which were smuggling oil into Turkey were also supplying weapons, equipment and training to Islamic State and other Islamist groups.
“It is an illegal government, Russia should see that it is not legal”, Erdogan said and added he spoke about this issue with his Russian counterpart, Vladimir Putin, on several occasions.
“Let’s decrease tensions with our rhetoric”, Davutoglu said. “The accusations should end”. With Russia suffering a deep recession and constricted by Western sanctions over Ukraine, he cast many of his aims in terms of national security, encouraging a balanced budget and self sufficiency in food production. “Sanctions are detrimental to both sides”.
According to Moscow, one of them was shot dead after landing; Russian and Syrian forces rescued the second; one Russian soldier was killed in that operation. Putin said Monday that he and President Barack Obama have a shared understanding on how to move toward a political settlement in Syria, but added that incidents like the recent downing of a Russian warplane by a Turkish fighter jet stymie broader cooperation against extremism.
Erdogan strongly denied the allegations, telling an audience Wednesday at Qatar University that “no one has the right to slander Turkey, especially the slander of Turkey buying ISIS oil….”
Putin said in his speech that Russia’s air campaign in Syria, which started on September 30, is meant to fend off a terror threat to Russian Federation posed by militant groups in Syria. “Who is buying oil [from I.S.]?”
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Putin said the military action has proven the capability of Russia’s modernized military.
