CANBERRA, June 22 (Xinhua) -- After announcing a temporary halt of all air operations in Syria earlier this week , the Australian Defence Force (ADF) will resume its right to undertake airborne missions, the Department of Defence announced Thursday.

Earlier this week, the ADF said it would suspend operations after Russia warned members of the U.S.-led coalition that any aircraft found west of the Euphrates River would be considered a "target" after an American F/A-18 Super Hornet shot down a Syrian SU-22 on Sunday.

The Department of Defence said the "suspension has been lifted," indicating that the decision to halt operations was only a temporary one.

"Following the Russian Ministry of Defence announcement that it would cease deconfliction efforts with Coalition aircraft operating in Syria, Australia implemented a temporary operational pause for air strike operations in Syria," the ADF said in a statement.

"This was a precautionary measure to allow the Coalition to assess the operational risk and the suspension has since been lifted.

"ADF operations in Iraq continue as part of the Coalition. As the Chief of the Defence Force, Air Chief Marshal Mark Binskin, stated on June 21, 2017, ADF strike operations in recent weeks have been in support of Iraqi forces retaking Mosul."

On Wednesday, Binskin told the Australian Broadcasting Corporation (ABC) that, as publicly-accessible ADF reports have shown, recent Australian air strikes have been occurring in Iraq and not in Syria.

"It hasn't affected our operations. If you look back at the logs that we put out fortnightly, you'll see that all out operations were in support of the retaking of Mosul," he said on Thursday.