Turkish Deputy PM: Russia denied its involvement in attack against Turkish military
Turkish Deputy Prime Minister and Government press-secretary Numan Kurtulmuş made a statement during a break during the meeting of the Council of Ministers where he noted that the Turkish government had received confirmation that Russia was not involved in the attack against the Turkish military that occured on November 24th in Syrian city of al-Bab.
According to Kurtulmuş, this was personally confirmed by Russian President Vladimir Putin, TRT reported.
"They have all the evidence and recordings from drones that were flying in that region and after receiving those evidence, all the necessary proactive steps will be carried out," Kurtulmuş stated.
The Deputy Prime Minister also made comments about the adoption of a recommendatory resolution by the European Parliament which requires the freezing of negotiations between Turkey and the EU. According to Kurtulmuş, the resolution is "an alarm bell" for European policy. He even went beyond that calling the resolution "futureless and reflecting the double standards system." However, the resolution has no legal force for the Turkish government.
Kurtulmuş stated that demonstrating a positive approach to the Turkish issue will be important at the forthcoming EU leaders meeting. Significantly, he noted, "We do not want our relations to die out or become worse as in case of a negative scenario, the European Union will be the first to be affected."