Representatives of Turkey's largest opposition parties have slammed the government's decision to allow NATO to expand its presence at the Incirlik airbase, saying that it is a violation of the constitution, and the country's status as a parliamentary democracy, Today's Zaman reports.

Speaking to the newspaper, Aytun Ciray, a lawmaker from the Republican People's Party, Turkey's largest opposition party, said that Ankara's decision to grant NATO countries other than the US the right to use its base represented a violation of the country's constitution. Furthermore, he noted that even if NATO countries do not require a formal memorandum to use the bases, the decision should still have been debated in parliament.

"Unfortunately," Ciray said, "the president has [been] circumventing parliament for a long time now. We cannot make decisions on national issues following debate. We are devoid of a Western-style parliamentary democracy at the moment."

Officially, Turkey is a secular, democratic, parliamentary representative republic. However, critics say that the anti-Kemalist reforms carried out by Recep Erdogan in recent years have challenged that status.

Ciray emphasized that NATO's expanded presence at Incirlik was a direct result of an unnecessary spat with Russia, following Turkey's downing of a Russian bomber over Syria late last month. With Russia expanding its presence in Syria's Latakia region following the attack, Ciray suggested that NATO felt that they had to expand their own presence at Incirlik, located in the southern Turkish city of Adana, about 130 kilometers from Syria's northwest border.

Ayhan Bilgen, an MP from the People's Democratic Party, Turkey's second-largest opposition party, emphasized that the use of Incirlik by countries including Germany and Britain would require the creation of a new mandate outlining military cross-border operations.

Ultimately, only the parliament, according to Bilgen, has the right to decide whether other countries are allowed to use the base.

Earlier this month, Germany announced that it would send as many as six Tornado reconnaissance planes, a tanker aircraft and a frigate for a non-combat mission to protect the Charles De Gaulle, a French aircraft carrier previously deployed to the region following last month's terrorist attacks in Paris. Berlin has also approved the deployment of up to 1,200 troops to the region, set to serve in non-combat positions in Turkey, Qatar and Kuwait.

On Thursday, Two German Tornado planes and an aircraft carrying military personnel arrived at the Incirlik base.