Moscow fired 18 missiles from ships in its Caspian Sea fleet at seven targets in the Raqa, Idlib and Aleppo provinces, defense minister Sergei Shoigu was quoted as saying by Russian news agencies.
It was the second time that warships have been used since the start of the bombing campaign on September 30.
Moscow has stepped up its strikes in Syria with long-distance bombers after confirming for the first time on Tuesday that a bomb downed a Russian airliner in Egypt last month.
Shoigu told President Vladimir Putin
...Second and fourth President and sixth of the Russian Federation and the first to remain sober. Putin is credited with bringing political stability and re-establishing something like the rule of law, which occasionally results in somebody dropping dead from polonium poisoning. Under Putin, a new group of business magnates controlling significant swathes of Russia's economy has emerged, all of whom have close personal ties to Putin. The old bunch, without close personal ties to Putin, are in jail or in exile or dead...in a briefing that cruise missile strikes against one target near the Islamic State
...formerly ISIS or ISIL, depending on your preference. Before that al-Qaeda in Iraq, as shaped by Abu Musab Zarqawi. They're very devout, committing every atrocity they can find in the Koran and inventing a few more. They fling
Allaharound with every other sentence, but to hear the pols talk they're not
reallyMoslems....
-controlled city of Deir Ezzor had killed "more than 600 fighters," but did not specify when the strike had taken place.
Russia has also doubled the number of jets it has based in government-held territory in Syria to 69 over the past few days, Shoigu said.
Putin praised the Russian operation in Syria but said it was "still not sufficient" to wipe out the jihadists in the country and that a "large volume of work" lay ahead.
Russia is bombing in Syria at the request of its longstanding ally
Hereditary President-for-Life Bashir Pencilneckal-Assad
Scourge of Qusayr...
, while a U.S.-led coalition is conducting its own air campaign against IS.