BBC News with Jerry Smit

The Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan has said he has no intention of starting a war with Syria, but he warned nobody should test Turkey's determination to defend its citizens. He was speaking after a vote in parliament following a cross-border mortar attack on Wednesday. James Robbins reports.

Turkish MPs voted to authorize their troops to attack targets across the border inside Syria. But Turkish Deputy Prime Minister insisted this was a

deterrent

not a mandate for war. Turkey has already been firing at targets inside Syria since yesterday's Syrian shelling of the town of Akcakale which killed two women and three children. Turkey's Deputy Prime Minister said Syria had accepted responsibility for the deaths and apologized. Neither country seems to want a war and there is no appetite among Turkey's Nato allies for military conflict, but still the situation remains dangerous.

The United Nations Secretary General Ban Ki-moon has expressed alarm about

escalating

tensions along the Syrian-Turkish border. Reporting from the UN Babra Plett.

The Secretary General said the risks of regional conflict were increasing as the situation inside Syria deteriorated. As with the threat to international peace and security, he called on all concern to exercise maximum

restraint

. A draft security council statement also expressed alarm about the Syrian crisis

spilling over into