Turkish police reportedly arrested the man who claimed he killed the Russian pilot who ejected from his warplane having been shot down by the Turkish Air Force last November.

Turkish police reportedly arrested the man who claimed he killed the Russian pilot who ejected from his warplane having been shot down by the Turkish Air Force last November.



Alparslan Celik who claimed he was behind the pilots murder has reportedly been detained in the Turkish city of Izmir on the Aegean Sea on Thursdayaccording to Turkey's Dogan news which reported that he was detained by police along with a dozen others while eating at a restaurant there.



Police also seized an assault rifle and two handguns.



"We are now going to study this information. As soon as we get concrete data we'll comment on them," the spokeswoman of the Russian Foreign Ministry, Maria Zakharova, told Russia's TASS.



In November 2015, Turkey shot down a Russian Su-24 for allegedly violating Turkish airspace. One of the pilots was executed upon landing, while the other was successfully rescued in a joint mission between Syrian and Russian special forces.



Celik was dining in a restaurant in the Turkish city of Izmir with 14 of his friends, when locals called the police to report a group of armed men.



The police arrested the visitors who tuned to be militants, seizing machineguns and pistols. Two days ago, Celik was seen in the a refugee camp along the Syrian frontiers. The photos released show Celik armed with auto machineguns in what appeared as a training camp.



The Russian pilot in question, Oleg Peshkov, was infamously shot while descending to the ground on his parachute after his Su-24 bomber was shot down by Turkish Air Force F-16's over the Syrian border with Turkey.



Celik, a Turkman, had previously said he would do it again since Peshkov was bombing his compatriots in Syria's northwest.



That incident saw relations between Russia and Turkey collapse with Moscow placing economic sanctions on Turkey and beefing up its military forces in Syria.







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