Russia and Turkey are due to a confrontation once more as the former fired warning shots at the latter's fishing boat on Sunday. According to officials, Russia's warship had to fire warning shots at the Turkish boat to prevent collision in the Aegean Sea.

According to the Russian defence ministry, one of Turkey's fishing vessels navigated around 600 metres close before it went the other direction in response to the shots. The captain of the Turkish vessel claimed that he did not know warning shots were fired. Moscow has summoned Turkey's military attaché to its foreign ministry regarding the matter. The new confrontation goes on top of the brewing tensions between the two countries after Turkey shot down one of Russia's warplanes.

"We are not in favour of tension," the BBC quoted Turkey's Foreign Minister Mevlut Cavusoglu on the recent incident. "We have always been in favour of overcoming tensions through dialogue rather than conflict."

The captain's boat confirmed to the Dogan news agency that he did not know about the warning shots. "We were not aware that they had fired shots at us," said Muzaffer Gecici. "We have video footage and we have handed this to the coastguard. We didn't even know it was a Russian ship."

According to the released statement of the ministry, Deputy Defence Minister Anatoly Antonov reprimanded the Turkish defence attaché on the incident. "The Turkish military diplomat was given a tough explanation about the potentially disastrous consequences from Ankara's reckless actions towards Russia's military contingent fighting against international terrorism in Syria," said the Defence Ministry in a statement (via Aljazeera).

"In particular, our deep concerns about more Turkish provocations towards the Russian destroyer Smetlivy were conveyed." The ministry also reiterated that the Turkish fishing vessel did not respond to the warnings to the said warship. It just changed its direction after the shots were fired.

Cavusoglu said earlier that Turkey wants to resolve the tensions with Russia through dialogue.

Contact the writer at feedback@ibtimes.com.au, or let us know what you think below.

RELATED STORIES