Putin, Hollande Agree to Coordinate on ’ISIS’ Fight
Local Editor
French President Francois Hollande and Russian leader Vladimir Putin agreed Thursday to coordinate strikes against "ISIS".
Putin indicated France and Russia would swap data to help identify "ISIS" targets in Syria.
The two countries agreed to "exchange information about which territories are occupied by the healthy part of the opposition rather than terrorists, and will avoid targeting them with our airstrikes," Putin said.
"The strikes against Daesh "ISIS" will be intensified and be the object of coordination," Hollande said at a press conference after their 90-minute meeting at the Kremlin.
The agreement to focus on "ISIS" targets was the most concrete progress from the final leg of Hollande's marathon push to weld together a broad alliance to crush "ISIS" after the November 13 terror attacks in Paris.
Russia has been flying a bombing campaign in Syria since September 30.
Prior to his visit to Moscow, Hollande gained support from Britain, whose premier David Cameron set out his case Thursday for air strikes against "ISIS" in Syria.
Cameron said Britain should not "wait until an attack takes place here" before acting, saying it was "morally" unacceptable to be "content with outsourcing our security to our allies".
A vote is expected to be held early next week and MPs look set to approve the move, meaning the first British air strikes on Syria could come within days.
Cameron has also offered France the use of a British air base in Cyprus for flying missions against the terrorists.
Hollande's diplomatic foray was thrown off track after Turkey shot down a Russian jet on the Syrian border on Tuesday, an incident Moscow described as a "planned provocation".
The sole surviving pilot said he received no warning and the aircraft did not violate Turkish air space.
The downing featured heavily in Putin's press conference with Hollande with the Kremlin strongman dismissing as "rubbish" claims by Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan that Ankara did not know the jet was Russian.
Putin also lashed out at Washington, saying that it had been informed of where the jet would be "and we were hit exactly there and at that time".
Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov welcomed a proposal by Hollande to close off the Syria-Turkey border, considered the main crossing point for foreign fighters seeking to join "ISIS".
"We would be ready to seriously consider the necessary measures for this," Lavrov said.
Source: News Agencies, Edited by website team
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