Circuit Wire — a daily news update from the Circuit.
Italian fighter jets flying NATO's Baltic Air Policing mission shot down a drone over Lithuania early on Tuesday, near the village of Pratkunai in the Kaisiadorys district, about 60 miles west of Vilnius. Lithuania's National Crisis Management Center said it was the first time a drone had been brought down in the country's airspace.
The wreckage came down near the Kaunas Reservoir. Antanas Matutis, commander of the Lithuanian air force, said it had been recovered and that the drone was likely carrying explosives. Vilmantas Vitkauskas, who heads the crisis center, told the public broadcaster LRT that it most likely crossed in from Belarus. It stayed in Lithuanian airspace for roughly 30 minutes and tracked along the edges of populated areas before the intercept. Officials have not said who sent it or what it was for, and the investigation continues.
A second incident followed the same day in the Baltic Sea. Denmark's Foreign Ministry said one of its air force helicopters was fired on with flares while taking routine photographs of a Russian frigate in waters off the port of Gedser. Copenhagen summoned the Russian ambassador and called the encounter completely unacceptable. Vladimir Barbin, Russia's ambassador to Denmark, said Danish helicopters had flown dangerous maneuvers near Russian warships before.
Lithuania sits between Belarus and the Russian exclave of Kaliningrad, and drone alarms are not new there. In May, residents of Vilnius were told to take shelter and the president and prime minister were moved to secure locations after drone activity near the Belarusian border. A NATO fighter shot down a stray Ukrainian drone over southern Estonia that same month.
Germany, Denmark, the United Kingdom and Poland have all accused Russia in recent weeks of drone incursions, sabotage, arson and surveillance of defense sites. NATO Secretary General Mark Rutte said on Monday that strikes close to alliance territory showed Moscow's "desperation," and he pledged to strengthen defenses along the eastern border with Russia and Belarus.
The shootdown came three days after a Russian drone hit a passenger train close to the Polish frontier, an incident Circuit Wire covered in its report on the strike at the Yahodyn crossing. A second drone came down less than a mile from the border, and the crossing shut for a time.
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