Russian parliament grants Putin right to use military In Syria

9/30/2015 5:48:02 AM

(MENAFN- The Journal Of Turkish Weekly) Russia's upper house of parliament has voted unanimously to grant President Vladimir Putin the right to deploy the country's military in Syria.

The Federation Council voted 162-0 with no abstentions to approve Putin's request.

Sergei Ivanov the head of Putin's administration said after the vote that the council's decision did not necessarily mean that Russian ground forces would take part in combat in Syria and that the approval referred to the use of the country's air force.

Russia has been building up its military presence in Syria where it has been supporting beleaguered President Bashar al-Assad in a four-year old conflict of government forces fighting Islamic State militants and Western-backed rebels.

Some media reports from the Middle East say Russian military jets have already carried out air strikes in Syria. The Kremlin has not confirmed those reports.

The last time the upper house of the Russian parliament granted Putin the right to deploy troops abroad -- which is required under Russian law -- Moscow seized the Ukrainian peninsula of Crimea in 2014.

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