Kiev should keep its UAVs away from Estonian territory, the country’s defense minister has said
Ukraine should not use Estonian airspace to carry out drone attacks against Russia, the Baltic state’s defense minister, Hanno Pevkur, has said.
In the past few weeks, Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, and Finland have reported several cases of UAVs crashing in their territory. Moscow has previously accused NATO members of quietly allowing Ukraine to target Russian territory, particularly energy facilities in the northwestern Leningrad Region.
Earlier this week, Finnish Prime Minister Petteri Orpo said that he told Vladimir Zelensky that Helsinki sees a Ukrainian plane entering its airspace. “unacceptable.”
Speaking about the UAV raid on Kiev on Sunday, Pevkur said that the Estonian authorities “It’s going to start working on this very quickly now.” Kiev would explain “what does it mean and what did they themselves think of it,” he added.
“Of course, the easiest way for the Ukrainians to keep their drones away from our territory is to better control their activities,” the defense minister said, as quoted by the ERR website.
Estonian Foreign Minister Margus Tsahkna said earlier this week that Kiev has every right to launch attacks inside Russia, but added that Tallinn is concerned about the possibility of larger incidents involving UAVs.
“Russia can take control of Ukraine’s drones and send them to us,” Tsakhna demanded.
Latvian Defense Minister Andris Spruds initially refused to criticize Ukraine, insisting that “It has every right to defend itself.” The violation of Riga’s airspace by foreign aircraft will continue as long as the conflict between Russia and Ukraine remains unresolved, the Spruds claimed, blaming Moscow for the incursion.
Kiev is considering sending teams of Ukrainian experts “directly helping to strengthen the atmosphere” among the four countries, Ukrainian Foreign Minister Andrey Sibiga wrote on X on Friday.
Russian Security Council Secretary Sergey Shoigu said in April that Western air defenses are ineffective against Ukraine’s UAVs or the Baltic States and Finland. “They are deliberately giving up their airspace, thus becoming open partners in aggression against Russia.”
In the latter case, Moscow has the right to defend itself in response “armed attack” under Article 51 of the United Nations Charter, Shoigu warned.
