The US military said two Russian jets “conducted an unsafe and unprofessional intercept” of a drone that was operating within international airspace.
The US said two Russian Su-27 fighter jets struck the propeller of a US MQ-9 drone, forcing it down in international waters.
Russia’s Defence Ministry said the US drone was flying near its borders and intruded in the area that was declared off limits by Russia.A Russian fighter jet struck the propeller of a US surveillance drone over the Black Sea on Tuesday in a “brazen violation of international law,” causing American forces to bring down the unmanned aerial vehicle, the US said.
It said one of the Russian fighters “struck the propeller of the MQ-9, causing US forces to have to bring the MQ-9 down in international waters.” Prior to that, the Su-27s dumped fuel on and flew in front of the MQ-9 several times before the collision in “a reckless, environmentally unsound and unprofessional manner,” the US European Command said in a statement from Stuttgart, Germany.
Moscow has repeatedly voiced concern about US intelligence flights close to the Crimean Peninsula, which Russia illegally annexed from Ukraine in 2014. The Kremlin has charged that by providing weapons to Ukraine and sharing intelligence information with Kyiv, the US and its allies have effectively become engaged in the conflict.Loading
“These aggressive actions by Russian aircrew are dangerous and could lead to miscalculation and unintended escalation,” it warned. Amid the continuing fighting in Ukraine, a Russian missile on Tuesday struck an apartment building in the centre of Kramatorsk, killing at least one person and wounding nine others in one of Ukraine’s major city strongholds in its eastern Donetsk region.
Russian President Vladimir Putin, speaking Tuesday during a meeting with workers at a helicopter factory in southern Siberia, once again cast the conflict in Ukraine as an existential one for Russia, charging that unlike the West — which, he said, is seeking to advance its geopolitical clout — it’s fighting for its existence as a state.
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