UK and Russia Agree To Work Together In Fight Against Isis

David Cameron and Vladimir Putin have agreed to work together in the fight against Islamic State (Isis), Downing Street has said.
The two men spoke by phone early on Wednesday, after the prime minister called Putin to update him on Britain’s military action in Syria, following last week’s House of Commons vote to extend RAF missions against Isis – also known as Isil, IS or Daesh – over the border from Iraq.

Cameron made clear Britain’s continued opposition to the participation of Syria’s president, Bashar al-Assad – an ally of Moscow – in any postwar regime in Damascus, telling Putin the country needed “a government that all the Syrian people can support”.

The prime minister also fended off a demand by the Russian president that he help provide British expertise to investigate how a Russian military plane was downed by Turkish military in November.

The shooting down of the plane, and the death of a Russian military pilot has led to a collapse in Russian-Turkish relations, and Putin appeared to try to enlist British involvement in the investigation as a neutral observer.

With Turkey a key ally of Britain, Cameron is unlikely to want to help since it might end with the UK having to judge whether the Turks had acted improperly. The Russians are understood to want UK assistance to interpret data in the black box of the plane.

The Russian pilot was shot dead as he parachuted from the aircraft into Syria, while another serviceman died on a search-and-rescue mission launched to retrieve him and a second crewman. The Russian defence minister, Sergei Shoigu, delivered the black box to the Kremlin on Wednesday, but was told by Putin not to allow it to be opened until international experts were available to examine it in the hope they will confirm Moscow’s version of events.