After a second Russian drone entered Lithuanian airspace, Latvia’s neighboring country has asked NATO for help in securing its airspace, Politico reports.
Lithuanian Defense Minister Dovilė Šakalienė and Foreign Minister Kęstutis Budrys have sent a letter to NATO Secretary General Mark Rutte asking for additional equipment, possibly experimental, to be deployed in Lithuania to protect its airspace to prevent threats. Šakalienė said on the 5th of August that similar incidents will continue as long as Russia continues its war in Ukraine, which means additional measures need to be taken.
It took the Lithuanian military almost a week to find the drone that crossed the country’s border on the 28th of July .
According to authorities, the initial theory is that Russia launched a drone towards Kyiv, but there was a glitch and it ended up in Lithuanian airspace. Šakalienė pointed out that although
there is no reason to believe that the drone was intentionally launched towards Lithuania,
the incident must be fully investigated. The investigation into the circumstances of the incident is ongoing.
With the increase in Russian air attacks on Ukraine, the risk that such incidents will occur more frequently on NATO’s border has increased. Similar incidents have already been reported in Poland, Romania and Latvia. Budrys described the situation as worrying for the entire alliance, and called for joint efforts to deal with the new type of threat. He said that that is not just Lithuanian airspace or just Lithuanian security – it is NATO airspace, NATO security, and also the security of the European Union.
Drones entered Lithuanian airspace twice in July. The first incident occurred on the 10th of July, when a Russian drone Gerbera crashed about a kilometer from the border in Lithuania after flying from Belarus.
Read also: A drone crashed in Lithuania. What is known?
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