Russia after Turkey-Syria border closure over arms flow

Russia’s foreign minister has called for the closure of the Turkish border with Syria, saying the region is used to smuggle weapons into the Arab country to supply terror groups operating in Syria.

Sergei Lavrov told the UN Human Rights Council in Geneva on Tuesday that some of the smuggled arms are hidden in humanitarian aid cargo.

"A very special task is to cut the terrorists' supply from the outside. For this purpose it is important to close the Syrian-Turkish border, since across this border those gangs receive arms, including with humanitarian convoys," he noted.

Lavrov further described a defeat of the Daesh Takfiri terror group, the al-Qaeda-linked al-Nusra Front and those of their kind as "a necessary precondition for securing the rights of long-suffering peoples of Syria" and the rest of the region.

Turkey has been among the main supporters of the terrorist groups operating in Syria, with reports saying that Ankara actively trains and arms the Takfiri terrorists there and facilitates their safe passage into the crisis-hit Arab state.

Ankara has also been accused on numerous occasions of being involved in illegal oil trade with the Daesh. Russia has released pictures and videos purportedly showing the movement of oil tankers from Daesh-controlled areas in Syria toward Turkey.

EA