MOSCOW — Russia’s foreign minister called the shooting down of one of its warplanes a “planned provocation” Wednesday.
“We have serious doubts it was an unplanned act. It looks like pre-planned action,” Sergei Lavrov said.
He added that the Kremlin had no intention “to go to war with Turkey” and said that “our attitude to the Turkish people hasn’t changed.”
RELATED: Putin decries Turkey’s ‘stab in the back’
However, Lavrov warned that Moscow would reassess its relations with Ankara after the incident. “We have questions about the actions of the current Turkish leadership,” Lavrov said.
On Tuesday, Turkey shot down the warplane it said had strayed onto its territory. The incident — which prompted a furious reaction from President Vladimir Putin — threatened to scupper international efforts to defeat ISIS and find a diplomatic solution to the Syrian civil war.
There were signs that Turkey was attempting to prevent the situation from boiling over. Turkey’s Foreign Ministry issued a statement late Tuesday saying “we have no intentions whatsoever to escalate the situation. Our contacts with the Russian authorities are ongoing to this end.”
And on Wednesday, Turkey’s Foreign Ministry said Russian and Turkish ministers had agreed to hold meetings on the incident, The Associated Press reported.
RELATED: Turkey shoots down Russian warplane near border with Syria Earlier, the Kremlin confirmed that one of the Russian pilots who ejected from the jet shot down by Turkey was “alive and well” after a 12-hour rescue behind enemy lines. The warplane crashed in an area controlled by militants trying to overthrow President Bashar Assad, a key Russian ally who Moscow is trying to prop up through airstrikes. Russia says it is targeting ISIS — but many areas where the group doesn’t have a presence have been bombed and other anti-Assad rebels say their positions have been hit. This article first appeared on NBCNews.com.
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