Turkish TV channel broadcasts pictures of alleged incident, which took place on strait that bisects Istanbul

This article is more than 4 years old

This article is more than 4 years old

Turkey accused Russia of a provocation on Sunday after a serviceman on the deck of a Russian naval ship allegedly held a rocket launcher on his shoulder as the vessel passed through Istanbul.



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Relations between the two countries have deteriorated sharply since last week when Turkey became the first Nato member in more than half a century to shoot down a Russian plane, which Turkey said had violated its airspace while flying sorties over Syria. The pilot was killed, while the navigator survived.



The Turkish NTV news channel broadcast photographs that it said showed a serviceman holding a rocket launcher on the deck of the landing ship Caesar Kunikov as it passed through the Bosphorus strait on Saturday.



“For a Russian soldier to display a rocket launcher or something similar while passing on a Russian warship is a provocation,” the foreign minister, Mevlüt Çavuşoğlu, told reporters, according to the Hürriyet news site. “If we perceive a threatening situation, we will give the necessary response.”



The Bosphorus, which bisects Istanbul, offers the only passage to the world’s oceans for the Russian Black Sea fleet. A first world war-era treaty obliges Turkey to allow all ships to pass during peacetime. Since the Russian plane went down, Moscow has introduced economic sanctions including a ban on Turkish foods and other products worth as much as $1bn.