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The Russian army confirmed the rescue during a special operation of the second pilot of Su-24 shot

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Moscow, November 25, 2015 (AFP) – The second pilot of the Russian plane Su-24 shot down Tuesday by Turkey was rescued after a special operation conducted jointly by the Syrian and Russian forces, announced Wednesday the Russian defense minister Sergei Shoigu. “The operation was a success. The pilot was repatriated on our base “Hmeimim in Syria, said Mr Shoigu was quoted by Russian news agencies, thanking” all our men who took huge risks all night “to save the driver. According to the Russian minister, the rescue operation, conducted jointly by Russian and Syrian special forces, “lasted 12 hours” and was declared finished at 3:40 Moscow time (0:40 GMT).

The other pilot of Su-24 was killed as he descended by parachute after ejecting, announced Tuesday the Russian General Staff, adding that a soldier participating in rescue operations was killed after that Mi-8 helicopter was damaged by gunfire. Sergei Shoigu also announced on Wednesday the deployment Hmeimim air base air defense systems S-400. The Moskva cruiser of the Russian fleet, equipped with air defense systems, has meanwhile arrived near the province of Latakia, in north-western Syria.

Russian President Vladimir Putin has confirmed the deployment of air defense systems to Hmeimin, which complements the measures announced Tuesday night by the Russian General Staff: sending the cruiser Moskva and the fact that Russian bombers will fly now under the protection of hunters . “I hope this deployment, as well as other measures taken, will be enough to ensure the safety of flights” planes of Russian army, Putin said, according to comments broadcast on television. Putin also confirmed that the second pilot had been “saved”, adding that “he and participating in rescue operations receive state honors.”

According to the Russian General Staff, the Su-24 was shot down by the Turkish army over Syrian territory without warning and it crashed four kilometers from the border, and Ankara says the Russian aircraft flying over its territory and had been warned “ten times in the space of five minutes.”

Wednesday, November 25, 2015,
Ara © armenews.com

Isis fighters capture Jordanian pilot after plane came down over Syria

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Image-released-by-Isis-pu-010Jordanian authorities confirm capture of pilot after first coalition warplane lost since air strikes began in Syria three months ago.

Fighters of the Islamic State (Isis) in Syria have scored a major propaganda coup by capturing a Jordanian air force pilot whose plane came down on Wednesday during an air raid by the international coalition near the northern city of Raqqa, the de facto jihadi capital.

Images posted on social media showed jubilant Isis gunmen, some of them masked, with a clearly frightened man, naked from the waist down and being dragged out of a lake. He was identified as the downed pilot and named on Twitter, which displayed his military ID card, as First Lieutenant Muadh al-Kasasbeh, 26. The Jordanian military immediately described him as a “hostage”.

The F-16 was the first warplane lost since the US-led coalition began air strikes against Isis in Syria three months ago. The group said it had shot down the fighter jet with a heat-seeking missile. It was not immediately clear whether it had indeed been shot down or suffered a technical failure. Another image on social media showing the plane’s intact cockpit canopy suggested that the pilot might have ejected.

Hundreds of coalition air attacks have helped stem Isis advances – though more successfully in Iraq than in Syria, where they have been criticised for weakening more moderate rebel groups fighting President Bashar al-Assad.

The Jordanian military issued a statement confirming the capture by Isis and saying it “holds the group and its supporters responsible for the safety of the pilot and his life”. It did not name him. “During a mission on Wednesday morning conducted by several Jordanian air force planes against hideouts of the IS terrorist organisation in the Raqqa region, one of the planes went down and the pilot was taken hostage,”, the Petra news agency quoted a source from the military’s general staff as saying. The Jordanian government went into emergency session to discuss its response.