Ankara, Sep 30: Turkey’s air force has brought down an unidentified drone on its fringe with Syria after it broke Turkish airspace on several occasions, the defence ministry reported.
The drone, distinguished close to the outskirt by the Turkish armed forces, entred into Turkish airspace multiple times (6 times) before it was downed by F-16 fighter jets on Sunday, according to Al-Jazeera news reports.
“An unmanned aerial vehicle which violated our air space six times [on Saturday] … was downed by two of our F-16s which took off from Incirlik [air base in southern Turkey],” the Ministry of National Defence stated while also sharing photos of the downed drone over its official Twitter handle.
The ministry said the unmanned drone was grounded at around 1:24 pm nearby time (10:24 GMT), including “the wreckage of the drone was found at the Cildiroba base” by the Turkish gendarmerie in the Kilis territory close to the Syrian outskirt.
The occurrence came a day after Syrian Foreign Minister Walid al-Muallem requested the prompt withdrawal of every single foreign power from its regions.
During his address to the United Nations General Assembly (UNGA) on Saturday in New York, al-Muallem said, “The United States and Turkey maintain an illegal military presence in northern Syria.”
“Any foreign forces operating in our territories without our authorization are occupying forces and should withdraw immediately,” he added.
He also said these nations were using “terrorism” as their vital tool to impose their insidious agendas on the people and governments that reject their external dictates.