Turkey honours Suleyman Shah's remains at ceremony

A ceremony was held on Monday to honour the remains of Suleyman Shah, grandfather of the founder of the Ottoman Empire, whose tomb was taken from a small Turkish enclave in Syria during a Turkish military operation over Saturday night.

Shah's tomb in northern Syria, about 40 kilometres from the border, had been regarded as Turkish soil since the breakup of the Ottoman Empire and had traditionally been guarded by 40 Turkish soldiers at a time.

But on Saturday night, more than 550 Turkish soldiers, flanked by dozens of tanks and supported by planes and helicopter, crossed into Syria and extracted Shah's remains as well as artefacts at the site before blowing up the tomb. 

Turkish authorities said the operation was performed to prevent the tomb from falling into the hands of Islamic State militants who have reportedly come closer to the area in recent days.

Just hours after the operation, a new tomb to house Shah's remains and those of his two guards was being constructed in Syria's Ashme district, west of Kobane.

Monday's ceremony was held at a border post in Sanliurfa’s Birecik district that began with a moment of silence and the Turkish national anthem. Turkish soldiers paid their respects with a gun salute during the ceremony.

The remains were being temporarily hosted at a building in the post and a Turkish flag was also hoisted outside its entrance.

Prime Minister Ahmet Davutoglu said on Sunday that one Turkish soldier died in an accident early in the operation.

The original burial place has now been rendered unusable on security grounds, and the Turkish special forces unit protecting the area has been brought back to Turkey, the prime minister added.

Damascus lashed out at the operation, saying that the move was an act of "flagrant aggression," state news agency SANA said over the weekend.

"Turkey is not satisfied with merely giving all kinds of support to its puppets Daesh (the Islamic State group), (al-Qaeda affiliate) the al-Nusra Front and other terrorist groups," said a foreign ministry statement carried by SANA. 

"It even carried out... a flagrant aggression against Syrian territory."