Turkmen forces in Syria shot dead the two pilots of a Russian jet downed by Turkish warplanes near the border with Turkey today as they descended with parachutes, a deputy commander of a Turkmen brigade told reporters.

"Both of the pilots were retrieved dead.

"Our comrades opened fire into the air and they died in the air," Alpaslan Celik, a deputy commander in a Syrian Turkmen brigade said near the Syrian village of Yamadi as he held what he said was a piece of a pilot's parachute.

Meanwhile, Syrian fighters destroyed a Russian helicopter with a missile, shortly after they forced it to make an emergency landing in a nearby government-held area in Syria's Latakia province today, the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said.

The helicopter was reportedly trying to locate the pilots of the jet which was downed by Turkey.

Air space violations

A Syrian insurgent group, recipient of US Tow missiles, said its fighters hit the helicopter with an anti-tank missile while it was in the air and put out a video showing the helicopter being blown up after one of its fighters struck it with another missile.

Rami Abdulrahman from the Observatory, which tracks the conflict in Syria through a wide network of sources, said at least 10 people were in the helicopter when it was hit by the insurgents but they were all evacuated when it landed and before the missile destroyed it.

The Russian Defence Ministry did not answer calls from Reuters seeking comment on the reports about the helicopter.

Earlier, Turkey's Dogan news agency reported that Russian military helicopters were searching for the pilots from a warplane downed near the Syrian border.

Turkish fighter jets shot down the Russian-made jet near the Syrian border after repeatedly warning it over air space violations, Turkish officials said, but Moscow said it could prove the jet had not left Syrian air space.

- Reuters

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