Turkish Air Force

The U.S. called on Russia to respect Turkey's airspace late on Jan. 30, following Turkish claims that a Russian warplane had crossed its southern border.

Russia's Association of Tour Operators (ATOR) has said that travel agency Brisco will launch charter flights to Bulgaria's Black Sea resorts in the summer to compensate for lost sales of package tours to Egypt and Turkey, TASS has reported.

Russia's Ural Tourism Association (UAT) has said that the number of Russian tourists spending their winter holidays in Bulgarian resorts increased by about 3% this season, reaching some 370,000 by early January, TASS reported on Wednesday.

Lyutvi Mestan, the ousted leader of Bulgaria's Movement for Rights and Freedoms (DPS) will formally exit the parliamentary group of the opposition centrist party to become an independent member of Parliament on Monday.

Deliveries of two Airbus A400M military transport planes to Turkey in 2016 are expected to be delayed and talks are ongoing on delivery of a replacement for one that crashed on its maiden flight last year, a defense official told Reuters.

Deutsche Welle reports that more Russian and German tourists are expected to visit Greece in 2016.

Egypt and Turkey, past popular destinations for Russia, noted a decline following the Russian passenger plane crash by ISIS bombing and the recent downing of a Russian jet fighter by the Turkish Air Force.

Bulgaria's DPS party chairman Lyutvi Mestan has said he doesn't plan to resign and no one has asked him to.

The Movement for Rights and Feedoms (DPS) is expected to decide on Thursday whether Lyutvi Mestan will remain leader of the second-largest opposition party in Bulgaria's current parliament, bTV has reported.

The downing of a Russian warplane by Turkey had been a "hostile act, not an act of unfriendliness," Russian  President Vladimir Putin said on Thursday.

Moscow had been particularly outraged that Turkey hadn't tried to explain its action and immediately turned to NATO for help instead, Putin told his end-of-year news conference in Moscow.

Turkey doesn't want tensions in its relationship with Russia as they affect the neighboring regions as well as world peace, Turkish Prime Minister Ahmet Davutoglu has said.