YEREVAN, JUNE 28, ARMENPRESS. Turkey will not pay compensation to Russia over the downing of a fighter jet last year and has only expressed regret over the incident, Prime Minister Binali Yildirim said on Tuesday, after President Tayyip Erdogan wrote to his Russian counterpart Reuters reports.

The Kremlin said on Monday that Erdogan had apologised to Russian leader Vladimir Putin in a letter. Erdogan's spokesman confirmed the letter to Putin but did not refer explicitly to an apology, saying the Turkish president had expressed regret and asked the family of the pilot to "excuse us."

Yildirim also told reporters in parliament that legal proceedings were underway against an individual allegedly responsible for the killing of the Russian pilot.

Russian-Turkish relations sank to a record-low after Turkish warplanes on November 24 last year downed a Russian Sukhoi-24 bomber over Syria. Ankara claimed that the plane had intruded into Turkish airspace. Moscow denied that.

On Monday, June 27 it was announced that President Erdogan in a message to Putin apologized for the downed bomber and expressed interest in settling the situation.