Syrian plane suspected of carrying arms forced to land inTurkey

Turkish jets on Wednesday forced a Syrian passenger plane to land at Ankara airport on suspicion that it may be carrying weapons and seized military communication equipments and parts that could be used in missiles.

An Airbus A320 coming from Moscow was intercepted by F16 jets as it entered Turkish airspace and escorted to the capital's Esenboğa Airport. The station said authorities grounded the plane on suspicion that it was carrying heavy weapons.

As a result of the inspections, Turkey found military communication equipments and seized parts that could be used in missiles. The plane was sent to Damascus with 37 passengers and crew.
Turkish Foreign Minister Ahmet Davutoğlu said in an interview with a Turkish network late on Wednesday that the intelligence suggested that the Syrian plane was carrying “non-civilian cargo” and “banned material.”

He said the plane was forced to land because of information that it may be carrying "certain equipment in breach of civil aviation rules."

The move comes amid heightened tensions between Turkey and Syria, which have been exchanging artillery fire across the volatile border in the past week.  Davutoğlu said Turkey was within its rights under international law to investigate civilian planes suspected to be carrying military materials.
Turkish foreign minister noted that whatever the inspectors find in the plane, Turkey would act in line with the international law and declined to unveil the source of the intelligence obtained by Turkey.
The head of Turkey's civil aviation agency Bilal Ekşi said there were 37 passengers and crew on board the plane. According to Moscow's Vnukovo airport, flight RB442 left for Damascus at 3:26 p.m. Moscow time (1126 GMT). It wasn't immediately clear whether this was the plane that was intercepted.
Russia, from where the Syrian plane took off, is one of Assad's closest remaining allies and has blocked tougher UN resolutions against Damascus.

"Once a week a Syrian Airlines airplane flies from Moscow bound for Damascus," Interfax reported Vnukovo Airport spokeswoman Yelena Krylova as saying. "The plane took off normally, there were no incidents."

Interfax cited her as saying 25 people were on board and that it was a charter plane. It was supposed to depart at 15:06, but left 20 minutes late.
Davutoğlu said the passengers were being treated "hospitably" and given meals while the plane's cargo was being inspected.

Officials in the Syrian information and foreign ministries could not immediately be reached for comment.
Earlier on the day, Turkish authorities declared the Syrian airspace to be unsafe and were stopping Turkish aircraft from flying over the civil-war torn country, the Foreign Ministry said.
Turkish plane that had already taken off for Saudi Arabia made a detour and landed at the Adana airport.

Davutoğlu said the Syrian airspace has increasingly become unsafe with unabated clashes on the ground as he clarified why Turkish authorities banned Turkish civilian planes to use the Syrian airspace. Observers claimed that Turkey made the decision to avoid any similar reprisal from the Syrian side against Turkish planes.
When asked if the plane was carrying arms, Davutoğlu declined to comment and said the material was banned to be carried by civilian cargoes.
"We are determined to control weapons transfers to a regime that carries out such brutal massacres against civilians. It is unacceptable that such a transfer is made using our airspace," Davutoğlu added.
Davutoğlu said Turkey was within its rights to investigate planes suspected to be carrying military materials and that the plane would be allowed to continue if it was found to be clean. He declined to comment on what the banned materials might be.

He said Turkey would continue to investigate Syrian civilian aircraft using its airspace.
Davutoğlu also dismissed claims suggesting that Russian President Vladimir Putin delayed his visit due to deepening divisions between Turkey and Russia over the festering Syrian conflict. He said he doesn’t think the landed Syrian plane will any way harm Turkish-Russian relations. He said Putin’s schedule was already a tentative one and that officials fixed his date in November. 
Earlier Wednesday, Turkey's military chief vowed to respond with more force to any further shelling from Syria, keeping up the pressure on its southern neighbor a day after NATO said it stood ready to defend Turkey.

Gen. Necdet Özel was inspecting troops who have been put on alert along the 910-kilometer (566-mile) border with Syria after a week of cross-border artillery and mortar exchanges escalated tensions between the neighbors, sparking fears of a wider regional conflict.
Turkey has reinforced the border with artillery guns and also deployed more fighter jets to an air base close to the border region since shelling from Syria killed five Turkish civilians last week.