Moscow: Russia has accused the United States of overlooking the oil trafficking to Turkey from the Syrian areas under Isis control,
"When US officials say they don't see how the terrorists' oil is smuggled to Turkey... It smells badly of a desire to cover up these acts," the Russian defence ministry said on its Facebook page on Saturday.
"The declarations of the Pentagon and the State Department seem like a theatre of the absurd," the statement added, suggesting that Washington "watch the videos taken by its (own) drones which have recently been three times as numerous over the Turkey-Syria border and above the oil zones".
The comments came after Washington dismissed the charge against its NATO ally, which directly implicated President Recep Tayyip Erdogan and his family in the trade, insisting there is no evidence to support it.
US special envoy and coordinator for international energy affairs, Amos Hochstein had said the amount of oil smuggled into Turkey from areas of Syria controlled by the Islamic State group is "of no significance from a volume perspective -- both volume of oil and volume of revenue".
Russia and Turkey have in recent days traded allegations that they are involved in the illegal trade, further ratcheting up tensions after Turkish jets downed a Russian bomber on the Syrian border.
Russian President Vladimir Putin branded Turkey's shoot-down a war crime on Thursday and said Turkey would face further sanctions. Moscow has already banned some Turkish food imports as part of a wider package of retaliatory sanctions.
