Estonia said on Sunday that the UN Security Council would hold an emergency meeting on the violation of the country’s airspace by Russian fighter jets, an incursion condemned by US President Donald Trump.
NATO forces intercepted three Russian MiG-31 fighters on Friday after they entered Estonian airspace over the Gulf of Finland, triggering complaints of a dangerous new provocation from the transatlantic alliance and the EU.
The Security Council was to convene an emergency session yesterday “in response to Russia’s brazen violation of Estonian airspace,” the Estonian Ministry of Foreign Affairs said.
Photo: AFP
The incursion came after fellow NATO member Poland said earlier this month Russian drones had repeatedly violated its airspace, in what Warsaw condemned as an “act of aggression.”
Trump on Sunday joined the condemnation of the latest airspace violation, vowing to defend Poland and the Baltic states in case of escalation from Russia.
Asked whether he would help defend the EU members if Russia intensifies hostilities, Trump told reporters: “Yeah, I would. I would.”
Trump’s at times friendly relations with Russian President Vladimir Putin have appeared to fray as the latter continues to press his invasion of Ukraine despite the US leader’s push for peace.
Trump on Thursday said at the close of a state visit to the UK that Putin had “really let me down” by continuing the war, now in its fourth year.
Western powers have said that Russia was playing with fire with its repeated ventures into NATO airspace, whose members have a mutual defencs assistance pact.
In the incident in Estonian airspace, Italian F-35 jets attached to NATO’s air defense support mission in the Baltic states, along with Swedish and Finnish aircraft, were scrambled to intercept the Russian jets and warn them off.
Asked whether he had been briefed on the situation in Estonia, Trump answered in the affirmative and added: “We don’t like it.”
That was a change in tone from his reaction to the Polish airspace incursion earlier in the month, which he said “could have been a mistake.”
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