Turkey deploys warning plane to Lithuania under NATO measures after Russian airspace violations

ANKARA (GWN) -Turkey briefly deployed a warning and control plane to Lithuania as half of NATO security measures, the defence ministry said on Thursday, following repeated airspace violations by Russian drones.

Lithuania, Estonia, Denmark and Poland have all said Russian drones or fighter jets have violated their airspace in latest weeks, prompting the NATO alliance to beef up defence around Europe’s japanese flank.

“Within the scope of NATO Assurance Measures, our Airborne Warning and Control System (AWACS) aircraft is carrying out missions in Lithuanian airspace between September 22-25,” the ministry said in its weekly press assertion.

AWACS are succesful of detecting low-flying drones and other objects that ground radars miss.

The ministry offered no additional data.

Poland has shot down some of the drones, and Lithuania’s parliament on Tuesday granted the armed forces powers to shoot down any unmanned drone violating its airspace.

Western officers say Russia is finishing up the airspace violations to check NATO’s readiness and resolve. Estonia and Poland have requested the alliance to open consultations under Article 4 of the NATO treaty.

Article 4 says members of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization will seek the advice of together whenever, in the opinion of any of them, the territory, political independence or security of any of them is threatened.

Turkey, NATO’s second largest military, has strong ties with Russia in areas including vitality and tourism. It has condemned Moscow’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine and offered Kyiv with army assist, but refrained from becoming a member of Western sanctions against Russia as half of a balancing act that it says helps it speak to both sides.

(Reporting by Tuvan Gumrukcu; Editing by Jonathan Spicer and Barbara Lewis)