{"id":77522,"date":"2025-09-21T19:42:09","date_gmt":"2025-09-21T19:42:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/77522\/"},"modified":"2025-09-21T19:42:09","modified_gmt":"2025-09-21T19:42:09","slug":"russian-military-plane-enters-airspace-over-baltic-sea-says-german-air-force-the-irish-times","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/77522\/","title":{"rendered":"Russian military plane enters airspace over Baltic Sea, says German air force \u2013 The Irish Times"},"content":{"rendered":"

Two German <\/a>Eurofighter jets were scrambled on Sunday to intercept a Russian military aircraft <\/a>above the Baltic Sea<\/a>, as Estonia <\/a>said it would call an emergency meeting of the UN Security Council after Russian planes violated its airspace.<\/p>\n

Germany\u2019s air force said the Russian Il-20M reconnaissance plane had switched off its transponders and ignored requests to make contact. The Eurofighters took off from the Rostock-Laage airbase to intercept the aircraft as it flew in international airspace.<\/p>\n

Tensions between Nato and Russia have been rising after a series of what European governments say are deliberate, provocative acts by the Kremlin. On Friday, three Russian MiG-31 fighters violated Estonian airspace in the Gulf of Finland. Moscow denies this.<\/p>\n

Asked if the US was willing to defend EU countries from further Russian aggression, US president Donald Trump on Sunday said: \u201cYeah, I would. I would.\u201d Earlier, Mr Trump said he \u201cdidn\u2019t like\u201d Russia\u2019s jet incursion but said he had not been briefed about it.<\/p>\n

Estonia condemned the Kremlin\u2019s \u201cbrazen\u201d behaviour. It said it was convening an emergency security council meeting for the first time in 34 years of Estonia\u2019s membership of the UN. World leaders are gathering this week in New York for the UN\u2019s general assembly.<\/p>\n

Estonian foreign minister Margus Tsahkna said the violation was \u201cpart of a broader pattern of escalation by Russia, both regionally and globally\u201d. It included violations of Polish and Romanian airspace. \u201cThis behaviour requires an international response,\u201d Mr Tsahkna said.<\/p>\n

Tallinn \u2013 a staunch supporter of Ukraine \u2013 has requested consultations under Nato\u2019s article four, which allows members to meet allies if their security is threatened. Last week, Polish foreign minister Radek Sikorski said Moscow was testing Nato\u2019s reactions with \u201cincremental\u201d hostile steps, short of a full-scale conflict.<\/p>\n

His comments at a security conference in Kyiv came after 19 Russian drones landed on Polish territory. Over the weekend, a man who was out foraging for mushrooms discovered debris from a decoy drone in a forested area, about 1.5km from the village of Sulmice, in Zamo\u015b\u0107 county.<\/p>\n

According to Bloomberg, citing Kremlin sources, Russian president Vladimir Putin has concluded that the US is unlikely to do much to strengthen Ukraine\u2019s defences after his August summit with Mr Trump in Alaska. Russia intends to step up its attacks to force Kyiv to capitulate, the agency reported.<\/p>\n

Reports suggest Washington is planning to reduce security assistance to Latvia, Lithuania and Estonia, which share a border with Russia.<\/p>\n

Estonian defence minister Hanno Pevkur said Russian actions were aimed at shifting the West\u2019s focus from Ukraine. \u201cThis is exactly what Russia wants \u2013 to divert our attention away from helping Ukraine and to focus on our own back yard. That\u2019s the key goal,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

Posting on Facebook, Latvian president Edgars Rink\u0117vi\u010ds said there was a risk of \u201cserious conflict\u201d if Russia continued in coming weeks to provoke Nato. European governments did not want a wider war but had no choice but to respond, he said.<\/p>\n

Mr Rink\u0117vi\u010ds added: \u201cRussia is doing just enough to make it seem like it is not going too far. But, knowing both the logic of thinking in Russia and the frequent incompetence at various levels, this [a conflict] could happen. The responsibility will lie with the Kremlin.\u201d<\/p>\n

Czech president Petr Pavel called on Nato to respond decisively to Russian aggression and to stay united. \u201cUnfortunately, this is balancing on the brink of conflict, but giving in to evil is simply impossible,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

Russia, meanwhile, accused the United Kingdom of being one of the leaders of what it said was a pro-war \u201ccamp\u201d. According to Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov, western attempts to pressure Russia would not work or help efforts to end the war in Ukraine.<\/p>\n

Speaking on Friday before his trip to the UN, Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelenskiy said he was ready to hold talks with Mr Putin or to meet him together with Mr Trump. Russia says this can happen only when the \u201croot causes\u201d of the war have been addressed \u2013 meaning once Ukraine has surrendered. \u2013 Guardian<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Two German Eurofighter jets were scrambled on Sunday to intercept a Russian military aircraft above the Baltic Sea,…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":77523,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[9,10,18,37809,13,14,6621,6,19,17,11,12,15,16,5,4897,550,9312,7,8],"class_list":{"0":"post-77522","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-headlines","8":"tag-breaking-news","9":"tag-breakingnews","10":"tag-eire","11":"tag-estonia","12":"tag-featured-news","13":"tag-featurednews","14":"tag-germany","15":"tag-headlines","16":"tag-ie","17":"tag-ireland","18":"tag-latest-news","19":"tag-latestnews","20":"tag-main-news","21":"tag-mainnews","22":"tag-news","23":"tag-north-atlantic-treaty-organisation-nato","24":"tag-russia","25":"tag-sweden","26":"tag-top-stories","27":"tag-topstories"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/77522","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=77522"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/77522\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/77523"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=77522"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=77522"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=77522"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}