Russia: Erdogan, family trade in oil with Daesh

OFFICIALS SHOW SATELLITE IMAGES OF THOUSANDS OF TRUCKS CARRYING CRUDE

In a major escalation of the war of words between Turkey and Russia, Moscow’s top brass yesterday accused the Turkish president and his family of personally benefiting from the illegal oil trade with Daesh terrorists.

The accusations follow Turkey’s downing of a Russian warplane near the Syrian border last week, which has set off an angry spat between the two nations that had developed close economic ties.

Speaking to dozens of foreign military attaches and hundreds of reporters in Moscow, Russian Deputy Defence Minister Anatoly Antonov said Russia has evidence showing that Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan and his family were linked to the Daesh oil trade.

“President Erdogan and his family are involved in this criminal business,” Antonov said. “We know the price of Erdogan’s words ... Turkish leaders won’t step down and they won’t acknowledge anything even if their faces are smeared with the stolen oil.”

Antonov claimed that Daesh terrorists make $2 billion a year from the illegal oil trade. Lieutenant General Sergei Rudskoi of the Russian military’s General Staff said Russian air strikes on the Daesh oil infrastructure in Syria had halved the terror group’s profits.

The defence ministry officials showed the journalists what they said were satellite images depicting thousands of trucks carrying oil from Daesh-occupied areas in Syria and Iraq into Turkey.

Erdogan, who is on a visit to Doha, said that Russia had no right to “slander” Turkey with allegations that it had bought oil from Daesh.

“No one has a right to engage in slander against Turkey by saying that Turkey is buying oil from Daesh,” Erdogan said. He said he did not want relations with Moscow to worsen further.