BBC News with Mike Cooper

Turkey has described the shooting down by Syria of a Turkish

reconnaissance

jet as a hostile act of the highest order, but said that it would not go to war over it. Turkey has requested a meeting of Nato members on Tuesday to discuss its response. Jonathan Head reports from Istanbul.

The Turkish government has been holding an emergency cabinet meeting to decide what its response should be to the shooting down of one of its aircraft by Syria on Friday. Coming out of that meeting, though, the signal from Deputy Prime Minister Bulent Arinc was that any response would be limited. We will not go to war, he said, despite the fact that Turkey insists the F-4 reconnaissance plane was in international airspace when it was hit without warning, and that Syria must have known it was a Turkish jet. He also revealed that Syria forces fired on a Turkish rescue plane that went to search for the missing crew members.

Cyprus is to ask the European Union for a financial bailout. The government in Nicosia said the island's banks were suffering from exposure to debt-laden Greece. The second largest bank in Cyprus is thought to be in need of urgent support. Cyprus becomes the fifth country in the eurozone to seek a bailout after the Irish Republic, Portugal, Greece and Spain.

The newly appointed finance minister of Greece, Vassilis Rapanos, has resigned. Mr Rapanos was admitted to hospital last week suffering