MOSCOW, December 28. /TASS/. There is no legal basis whatsoever behind remarks by Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan who said that Syrian leader Bashar al-Assad is a terrorist, Russian Foreign Ministry Spokeswoman Maria Zakharova said on Thursday.

"As for the fact that the Turkish president called Syria’s President Bashar al-Assad a terrorist, Syrian government representatives are at the UN and represent the Syrian government at the UN Security Council, so this [statement] has no legal basis whatsoever, even without additional assessments and arguments," Zakharova pointed out.

"I will not talk about the moral aspect. From the legal point of view, such statements are unsubstantiated," the diplomat added.

The Turkish president earlier said, while in Tunisia, that "it is impossible to cooperate with Syrian President Bashar al-Assad," who, he claimed, "killed about one million of his citizens."