AFP, Dubai :
Saudi Arabia has deployed warplanes to a Turkish airbase in order to “intensify” its operations against the Islamic State group in Syria, a senior Saudi defence official has said.
“The Saudi kingdom now has a presence at Incirlik airbase in Turkey,” brigadier general Ahmed al-Assiri was quoted as saying by Al-Arabiya television late on Saturday.
“Saudi warplanes are present with their crews to intensify aerial operations along with missions launched from bases in Saudi Arabia,” Assiri said, without providing further details.
Turkish Foreign Minister Mevlut Cavusoglu said Saturday that Saudi jets would be deployed at Incirlik, and that the two countries could participate in ground operations against IS in Syria.
Riyadh and Ankara are both opposed to Syrian President Bashar al-Assad, whose foreign minister last week warned that any ground intervention would “amount to aggression that must be resisted”.
Assiri said the decision to deploy an unspecified number of jets to Turkey followed a meeting in Brussels of US-led anti-IS coalition members, who decided step up their fight against the jihadists in Syria and Iraq.
He stressed that Saudi had made its decision in coordination with the coalition and said that a ground operation was being planned.
“There is a consensus among coalition forces on the need for ground operations and the kingdom is committed to that,” Assiri said.
“Military experts will meet in the coming days to finalise the details, the task force and the role to be played by each country.”
Turkey on Saturday hit Kurdish and Syrian regime positions in northern Syria, further complicating efforts to end the war, which has killed more than 260,000 since it began in 2011.
Another report adds: Saudi Arabia intercepted a Scud missile fired towards the kingdom by Iran-backed rebels in Yemen, the Riyadh-led coalition fighting the insurgents has said.
The official Saudi SPA news agency said the missile was destroyed by the kingdom’s air defences at around 2145 (1845 GMT) on Saturday, around 100 kilometres (60 miles) from its border with Yemen.
Yemen’s Shiite Huthi rebels meanwhile said in a statement on their sabanews.net website that the missile targeted the Abha Regional Airport in southern Saudi Arabia.
The missile “precisely hit its target,” it said.
Saturday’s incident is the third time Saudi Arabia says it has shot down a Scud fired from Yemen.
On Tuesday, the coalition said that a Saudi Patriot missile had downed a Scud fired from the rebel-held Yemeni capital, Sanaa.
Riyadh has deployed Patriots designed to counter tactical ballistic missiles, which have been fired occasionally since March when the coalition began air strikes in support of the Yemeni government after Huthi rebels seized Sanaa and advanced towards second city Aden.
