COPENHAGEN, March 31 (Reuters) – Estonia and Latvia both detected foreign drone activity near their borders with Russia overnight, their militaries said, in the latest such incidents to unsettle NATO’s eastern flank.
Estonia’s defence forces said in a statement on Tuesday they had detected “potentially dangerous air activity” inside and outside the Baltic country’s airspace overnight.
“A preventive threat notification was sent out,” and the threats had since passed, they added.
It was “highly likely that Ukrainian drones that went astray were involved,” Colonel Uku Arold, a spokesperson for the Estonian defence forces, told Estonia’s public broadcaster ERR.
Authorities did not reply to a request for comment.
Debris from at least one drone was found in Estonia’s Tartu county, with reports of further finds being investigated, according to ERR.
Latvia’s National Armed Forces said in a separate statement they had detected a foreign unmanned aerial vehicle near the Latvian-Russian border late on Monday. The aircraft did not enter Latvian airspace, it added.
2,500 DRONES
Ukraine has stepped up drone attacks on Russian oil refineries and export routes over recent weeks, some close to Russia’s border with the Baltic countries and Finland, in an attempt to weaken Moscow’s war economy.
“In recent weeks, Ukraine has struck Russia’s oil ports on the Gulf of Finland with more than 2,500 drones,” Finnish Prime Minister Petteri Orpo told a press conference, adding that there was nothing to suggest that Finland was facing a direct military threat.
A stray Ukrainian drone crashed in Finland on Sunday, the first time the Russia-Ukraine war had spilled on to Finnish soil. Police said on Monday the drone appeared to have carried an unexploded warhead.
Finland’s defence forces and border guard have stepped up their readiness due to the Ukrainian attacks in Russia over the past two weeks, they said on Tuesday.
“When it looks like there is a bigger operation, we have our jets in the air, as they were almost throughout last night,” Finnish Air Force Commander Timo Herranen told the press conference.
(Reporting by Andrius Sytas, Janis Laizans and Anne Kauranen, writing by Stine Jacobsen, editing by Andrew Heavens, Anna Ringstrom and Keith Weir)
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