BRUSSELS, December 1. /TASS/. NATO has provided "political coverage" to Ankara in the incident with Turkey’s downing a Russian warplane in Syria and so, the alliance shares the responsibility for it, Russia’s Permanent Representative at NATO Alexander Grushko said on Tuesday, commenting of the statement of NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg that Russia and NATO had discussed the incident with the Russian Su-24 bomber.

Deliberate Attack

"I had a conversation with NATO Deputy Secretary General Alexander Vershbow about the incident with the Su-24. He did not confine himself to the aspects that had been mentioned by Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg. I informed him of Russia’s position on the incident and cited the military and political factors that testify to the fact that it was a deliberate attack on the Russian plane in Syria’s airspace," Grushko said.

"I stressed that NATO, which gave no principled assessment of this illegal act, as a matter of fact, politically covered up Ankara as its member and that is why it shares responsibility for the incident," he said. "Once again, we see that political considerations are getting the upper hand over objectivity and mere common sense."

In violation of NATO practices

"I would like to note that this is not the first time when NATO uses double standards in the interests of Atlantic solidarity. I will give an example. The NATO Council statement of October 5 on the so-called violations of the Turkish airspace by Russian planes refers to NATO’s practice, in line with which a Turkish fighter approached the so-called violator, identified it and accompanied to the point of leaving the country’s airspace," he said. "In the case of the November 24 incident [when the Russian Su-24 bomber was downed by a Turkish fighter jet], even if we take for granted the absolutely ungrounded version of violation of Turkey’s airspace, these NATO’s practices were not observed, since, according to Ankara, the pilots did not even know the identity of the violator plane."

"NATO prefers not to go in detail what was the reason for Turkey’s decision to launch a missile to down a plane which was flying in Syria’s airspace and which posed no threat to Turkey," he said.