(CNN)Tensions in the Middle East have escalated after Turkey shot down a Russian warplane, with the Turkish President accusing Russia of deceit and Moscow announcing it will deploy anti-aircraft missiles to Syria.
There
has been bellicose rhetoric on both sides, missiles are being deployed,
and Russia and Turkey have each accused the other of supporting
terrorism.
Now the economic weapons are being unsheathed.
Russia's
Agriculture Ministry has announced it is strengthening controls over
food and agriculture imports from Turkey. A statement on the Agriculture
Ministry website said there would be "additional checks on the border
and at production sites in Turkey" in response to what it said were
"repeated violations of Russian standards by Turkish producers."
Russia's
Agriculture Minister Alexander Tkachev is quoted on the ministry's
website saying that roughly 15% of Turkish agricultural products fail to
meet Russian standards.
In
addition, Russia's state-run consumer protection body said it had
concerns about the quality and safety of children's clothing, furniture
and cleaning products originating from Turkey.
Some
Russian tour operators have already said they will be curtailing travel
to Turkey -- a favorite destination for many Russian vacationers.
Wednesday,
Russian Defense Minister Sergey Shoygu said on his ministry's Twitter
feed that the country would instal S-400 defense missile systems at its
Hmeymim air base near Latakia, on Syria's Mediterranean coast.
The missiles have a range of 250 kilometers (155 miles), according to the missilethreat.com website. The Turkish border is less than 45 kilometers (30 miles) away.
And
Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov said Moscow has "serious doubts"
that Turkey's downing of the Sukhoi Su-24 bomber near the
Turkish-Syrian border Tuesday was a spur of the moment act.
"It looks very much like a planned provocation," Lavrov said.
The
unusual clash between Russia and a NATO member highlights the dangerous
and unpredictable nature of the Syrian war, which has drawn global
powers, including the United States, into a chaotic and complex
conflict.
Turkey says Russian planes breached its sovereignty
Turkey
and Russia have starkly different positions on Syria, with Ankara
supporting rebels opposed to Syrian President Bashar al-Assad, a key
ally of Moscow.
Turkish
President Recep Tayyip Erdogan condemned what he said was the violation
of airspace by Russian warplanes, calling it an infringement of his
country's sovereignty. Turkey had repeatedly complained in the past of
similar incidents.
He charged Russia
with propping up the Assad government -- a regime he said was inflicting
terrorism on its own people. His remarks came a day after Russian
President Vladimir Putin accused Turkey of being "the terrorists'
accomplices" for shooting down a plane he claimed was on an
anti-terrorism mission.
Erdogan disputed that claim in a speech.
"There
is no Daesh" in the area where the Russian planes were flying, Erdogan
said, using another name for ISIS. "Do not deceive us! We know the
locations of Daesh."
Contacts between Turkish and Russian officials
And experts agree.
"None
of the targets that ... the Russians were going after had anything to
do with ISIS. Those were all those Turkmen groups," said CNN military
analyst Cedric Leighton, a retired U.S. Air Force colonel.
The
Turkmen minority in that part of northern Syria has strong ties to the
Turkish government, which wants to afford them a degree of protection.
Anyone who bombs that area attacks "our brothers and sisters --
Turkmen," Erdogan has said.
Turkish
Prime Minister Ahmet Davutoglu said his country doesn't want to "drive a
wedge" into its relationship with Russia, according to the semiofficial
Anadolu news agency. And the two countries' foreign ministers have
already spoken by phone and plan to meet in person over the coming days,
the news agency reported, citing a Turkish Foreign Ministry spokesman.
Russia's Foreign Affairs Ministry said Lavrov "expressed indignation" over the incident during the phone call.
Two
high-ranking Russian military officers have visited the Turkish general
staff since the plane was shot down, Anadolu reported.
"Every
question about the incident has been answered," the general staff said,
according to the news agency. It said that images from radar displays
were shown to the Russian attaches during visits in Ankara.
Even
as Erdogan has insisted Turkey doesn't want to escalate the situation,
the anger in his words -- and those of Putin -- showed that the conflict
in Syria has now churned up a new and alarming wave of international
turbulence.
The stakes are high in
Syria, where the United States, Russia and a swarm of other global,
regional and local forces are entangled in the civil war.
Turkey releases tape
Turkey, a NATO
member, said it had repeatedly warned the Russian warplane, shooting it
down only after it ignored several warnings and violated Turkish
airspace.
Russia
rejected that version of events, with the rescued co-pilot Capt.
Konstantin Murakhtin telling state media reporters that "there were no
warnings -- not via the radio, not visually."
"If
they wanted to warn us, they could have shown themselves by heading on a
parallel course," Murakhtin said, according to the official Sputnik
news agency. "But there was nothing."
The
Russian military said it believed the other crew member in the bomber
was killed, as was a marine taking part in search and rescue efforts.
Putin
has said the Russian plane was attacked 1 kilometer inside Syrian
territory. But Erdogan said parts of the downed plane had fallen inside
Turkey, injuring two people.
On Wednesday, Turkey's military released an audio recording of what it says was its warning to the Russian warplane.
In
one portion, a voice is heard saying: "This is Turkish Air Force
speaking on guard. You are approaching Turkish airspace. Change your
heading south immediately. Change your heading south."
Russia has not yet commented on the audio.
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